Samuel T. Peavy

Abstract

Miller, H.G., G.J. Kilfoil, and S.T. Peavy, An integrated geophysical interpretation of the Carboniferous Bay St. George Subbasin, Western Newfoundland, Bulletin of Canadian Petroleum Geology, Vol. 38, No. 3 (Sept.,1990), p. 320 -331.

Abstract: Gravity, magnetic and reflection seismic data were compiled and interpreted to determine the basement configuration and internal structure in the Carboniferous Bay St. George Subbasin of Western Newfoundland and the ascertain the relationship of the known petroleum and coal occurences to the geophysically determined structure.

Gravity profiles, selected where best constrained by the seismic interpretation and geology, were modelled using available physical parameters to obtain estimates of depth to basement, configuration of major lithological units and the extent of large evaporite structures within the Carboniferous strata.

The offshore portion of the study area has the configuration of a half-graben dipping monoclinally to the southeast except where interrupted locally by faults. Onshore, only limited confidential seismic data were available but the gravity and magnetic data suggest that the general structure is similar to that offshore, with elongate depocentres parallelling the basin bounding the Long Range Fault trend. The maximum thickness of Carboniferous sediments in individual depocentres is interpreted as 6 km offshore and 4 km onshore.

The subbasin is transected by several east-west, dextral, principally strike-slip faults across which there is dextral offset of up to 5 km; the features are approximately 10 km apart. Vertical displacements associated with the features are minimal with a single exception where a throw of greater than 2 km has been identified from offsets in the basement seismic reflector. The features appear to postdate deposition of the Mississippian-aged Codroy Group, and may be late Mississippian or early Pennsylvanian.

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