ABSTRACT

Jurassic and Cretaceous strata in the Foothills near Kinuseo Creek are divisible into three tectonostratigraphic packages. The lower package consists of Fernie Group strata and the lower part of the Minnes Group. Strata are characteristically folded and thickened by numerous thrust faults. Open anticlines and synclines are thought to overlie and be related to ramps in underlying thrust faults affecting Triassic and older strata. An intermediate package includes strata from the upper part of the Minnes Group to the top of the Fort St. John Group. There strata are characteristically folded into large chevron type synclines separated by complex, faulted anticlines. Smoky Group strata contained within the upper package are folded into broad open synclines characterized by gently dipping limbs. Major detachment surfaces, including a lower one within Minnes Group sands and shales and an upper one within Shaftesbury Formation shales, separate the tectonostratigraphic packages.

Strata within the lower two tectonostratigraphic packages are more shortened than strata within the upper package. A major east-dipping, west-verging backthurst underlies the west margin of the upper package and is thought to have accommodated much of this excess shortening.

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