The Sovanco Fracture Zone is a right lateral-moving

transform fault A transform fault or transform boundary, is a fault along a plate boundary where the motion is predominantly horizontal. It ends abruptly where it connects to another plate boundary, either another transform, a spreading ridge, or a subductio ...

and associated

fracture zone A fracture zone is a linear feature on the ocean floor—often hundreds, even thousands of kilometers long—resulting from the action of offset mid-ocean ridge axis segments. They are a consequence of plate tectonics. Lithospheric plates on eit ...

located offshore of

Vancouver Island Vancouver Island is an island in the northeastern Pacific Ocean and part of the Canadian Provinces and territories of Canada, province of British Columbia. The island is in length, in width at its widest point, and in total area, while are o ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

. It runs between the northern end of the

Juan de Fuca Ridge The Juan de Fuca Ridge is a mid-ocean spreading center and divergent plate boundary located off the coast of the Pacific Northwest region of North America. The ridge separates the Pacific Plate to the west and the Juan de Fuca Plate to the east ...

and the southern end of the

Explorer Ridge The Explorer Ridge is a mid-ocean ridge, a divergent tectonic plate boundary located about west of Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. It lies at the northern extremity of the Pacific spreading axis. To its east is the Explorer Plate, ...

, forming part of the boundary between the

Pacific Plate The Pacific Plate is an oceanic tectonic plate that lies beneath the Pacific Ocean. At , it is the largest tectonic plate. The plate first came into existence 190 million years ago, at the triple junction between the Farallon, Phoenix, and Iza ...

and the

Explorer Plate The Explorer Plate is an oceanic tectonic plate beneath the Pacific Ocean off the west coast of Vancouver Island, Canada, which is partially subducted under the North American Plate. Along with the Juan de Fuca Plate and Gorda Plate, the Explor ...

. To its west lies the

Explorer Seamount The Explorer Seamount is a seamount located in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of British Columbia, Canada. It is on the Explorer Ridge, a tectonic spreading centre that separates the Pacific and Explorer plates and so the volcanism is rift-rel ...

References

Cowan, Darrel S.; Botros, Mona; Johnson, H. Paul, 1986, ''Bookshelf tectonics: rotated crustal blocks within the Sovanco fracture zone'', Geophysical Research Letters, Volume 13, Issue 10, p. 995-998, abstract
{{BritishColumbiaCoast-geo-stub Fracture zones Geology of British Columbia South Coast of British Columbia Oceanography of Canada