Sampling and seismic profiling in the Tofino Basin west of Vancouver Island show there is a thick sequence of Tertiary rocks ranging in age from late Eocene to Pliocene. The rocks are mainly mudstones containing abundant foraminifera indicating a bathyal depositional environment throughout most of the Tertiary. Subsequent uplift has exposed the deep water sediments on the shelf over much of the area. Eocene-Oligocene sediments occur in a belt along the inner shelf, while Miocene and Pliocene rocks lie seaward of this. Pliocene rocks form a regressive sequence overlapping the older Tertiary, with the greatest thickness in the south.At least two major periods of deformation resulted in faulting, folding, and diapirism on the continental shelf. Deformational patterns show a marked change from north to south. North of Brooks Peninsula sediments are undeformed by folding but are truncated by faulting along the steep continental slope. The Kyuquot Uplift south of Brooks Peninsula exposes Eocene-Oligocene sediments across the shelf. Farther south Mio-Pliocene sediments unconformably overlie the uplift. Folding increases southward culminating in an area of diapirism off Nootka Sound. Elongate diapirs trend parallel or subparallel to the coastline.Tectonic features on the shelf and slope appear to be related to present and earlier configurations of nearby offshore spreading centers, plates, and transform faults. Crustal plate movements may have been responsible for the observed shelf and slope deformations.

A gravity and magnetic survey of the Strait of Juan de Fuca and adjacent Pacific continental shelf was conducted to define the tectonic framework in this 20 to 35 km wide seaway and its relation to that of Vancouver Island and the Olympic Peninsula. The offshore extensions of large onshore faults are delineated by linear magnetic and gravity anomalies. One of these, the Leech River fault of southern Vancouver Island, marks the northern limit of oceanic-type basaltic basement present in western Washington and Oregon. This fault probably continues southeast-ward from Vancouver Island across the strait to near the northeastern coast of the Olympic Peninsula, and westward across the strait to the continental shelf off Cape Flattery. The Calawah fault, which extends northwestward from near Cape Flattery onto the Pacific shelf, terminates the Leech River fault. Northwest of the Leech River fault on the shelf, the Calawah fault probably is the contact between oceanic and continental crustal types. The gravity and magnetic data also indicate the location of folds, other faults, and areas of shallow basement rocks.

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Preliminary analyses of gravity, magnetic, seismic reflection and refraction, dredging, and heat flow measurements off Queen Charlotte Islands and Vancouver Island are presented. Seismic reflection and gravity measurements show the presence of a sedimentary basin at the foot of the continental slope in which the sediments are progressively more intensely deformed from north to south, indicating the interactions between the lithospheric plates. Heat flow values in the northern part of Explorer Ridge, and recovery of fresh basalts with little mineral coating in this region suggest that Explorer Ridge is a presently active spreading segment of East Pacific Rise. Seismic Refraction results in the deep ocean basin west of Queen Charlotte Islands show a marked anisotropic mantle P wave velocity, the direction of maximum velocity being 107° east of north and the maximum change in velocity being about 0.6 km/s.