New River Formation (Fontaine, 1874; redefined by Read and Mamay, 1964). Sandstone, siltstone, shale, coal, underclay, and limestone. Sandstone, feldspathic, micaceous, disseminated dark mineral grains, light- to medium-light-gray, very-fine- to coarse-grained, locally conglomeratic with quartz pebbles as much as 3 inches in diameter, thin- to thick-bedded, locally massive, ripple-bedded, cross-bedded; contains carbonaceous fragments. Siltstone, medium-light- to medium-gray, even-bedded, ripple-bedded, deformed locally. Shale, medium- gray to black, evenly to indistinctly bedded, with few very fissile carbonaceous beds, plant fossils, ironstone laminations and concretions. Coal, finely cleated, impure coal partings in several beds, locally grades into black carbonaceous shale. Underclay, medium-gray, clayey to silty, contains root casts. Limestone, medium-gray, argillaceous, in thin discontinuous beds and ellipsoidal concretions locally occurs near base and middle part of formation. Marine invertebrate fossils locally in basal bed. Base is conformable with Pocahontas Formation and placed at bottom of Pocahontas No. 8 coal bed in most outcrop areas (Englund and Thomas, 1990). Northwest of outcrop belt, base is unconformable with the underlying Pocahontas Formation. The New River is thickest in western Tazewell and eastern Buchanan counties (Englund, 1981); it ranges from 1380 to 1925 feet in thickness.