Lochailort

Also within

Inverness County

Condition (NatureScot)

Description

Lochailort Lochailort SSSI is a small geological site which provides one of the few accessible, informative sections across the important boundary between two of the major divisions of the Moine, the Glenfinnan and Morar. To the north, the Sgurr Beag Slide in Ross-shire, has been recognised as a major structural break, separating these two divisions. In the Lochailort area, critical structural evidence, including the development of characteristic "platy" rocks, suggests that here also, the Morar- Glenfinnan boundary is also a structural break -the Lochailort Slide, which has been correlated with the Sgurr Beag Slide and regarded as its southerly continuation. The nature of this important boundary helps appraise the relative ages of the Morar and Glenfinnan divisions and contributes to evidence concerning the geographical extent, age and amount of displacement associated with the Sgurr Beag Slide. Overall it is fundamental to an understanding of the metamorphic and deformational history of the Moine in the Northwest Highlands.