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Geological Society, London, Special Publications; 1974; v. 4; p. 591-623;
DOI: 10.1144/GSL.SP.2005.004.01.37
© 1974 Geological Society of London

Circum-Pacific and Caribbean Orogens

Western Canada

J. O. Wheeler

Geological Survey of Canada, 601 Booth Street, Ottawa

H. A. K. Charlesworth

Department of Geology, University of Alberta, Edmonton

J. W. H. Monger

Geological Survey of Canada, 100 West Pender Street, Vancouver, British Columbia

J. E. Muller

Geological Survey of Canada, 100 West Pender Street, Vancouver, British Columbia

R. A. Price

Department of Geological Sciences, Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario

J. E. Reesor

Geological Survey of Canada, 601 Booth Street, Ottawa

J. A. Roddick

Geological Survey of Canada, 100 West Pender Street, Vancouver, British Columbia

P. S. Simony

Department of Geology, University of Calgary, Alberta

In this volume the main Western Cordillera of North America is represented by the following analysis of a segment across south-western Canada from the Interior Plains to the Pacific. It is an orogenic belt which has been intensively studied as a unit in many of its aspects, and in the eastern part of which accurate deep borehole data are available from oil exploration activities. It is a complex, with outward facing highly deformed zones separated by a much less deformed median belt, and one which has a long history of plutonic intrusion.

Much of the critical information quoted is new, and the detailed data are preceded by a full analysis of the developmental history of the belt.

Segment: the ‘segment’ of the Western Canadian Cordillera described here has a length, measured along the strike, of 160 km. Within this segment the margin of the belt against the non-orogenic area to the east is narrowly gradational (1/2 to 3 km) and the western margin is submarine. The orogenic belt has an exposed width of 800 km.

Zones: the Canadian Cordillera is formed of two intensely tectonized belts—the Western and Eastern Cordillera—separated by a less tectonized zone, the Interior Plateau. The Western Cordillera comprises zones 1–3, the Interior Plateau is zone 4 and the Eastern Cordillera includes zones 5 and 6.

Zone 1 (Insular Belt)—volcanic and plutonic rocks are dominant, with thick Triassic basaltic volcanics and major Jurassic plutonic rocks. Metamorphism occurred in Jurassic times. Stratified rocks range in age from Carboniferous

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