Newsletter #2, September 1998
LasWelcome to the second newsletter of the McGill Student Chapter of the Society of Economic Geologists. Since the last newsletter lots of new and exciting things have happened to the Chapter. Perhaps the best news, in this time of uncertainty in the mining industry, is the fact that in the past year the Chapter was able to secure sponsorship from eleven mineral exploration companies as well as financial support from another three companies for the annual Latin America mineral deposit trip (more about that later). Membership of the Chapter remained at thirty students, with both undergraduate and graduate students equally represented. It is hoped that we can "recruit" more members in the Mining and Metallurgical Engineering Department through our mining representative Colleen Roche.
At the end of last session a new committee was elected to oversee the running of the Chapter. For the new session Martin Heiligmann (President), Nicholas Barnes (Vice-President), Alex Wills (Treasurer), and Sandy Archibald (Secretary) were elected. Last year we were able to invite two speakers from Québec and Ontario.
This year, with finances looking better, we expect to have speakers from Toronto, Montréal, Ottawa and Kingston. Our winter field trip took members to snowy Gouverneur, New York, to visit the Balmat-Edwards SEDEX district. This was then followed by the Latin America mineral deposit trip to the hot climes of Nicaragua led by our faculty sponsor "Willy" Williams-Jones. Again, in early April members attended to the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada meeting in Toronto.
Upcoming activities for the Chapter in the new session will include a field trip to the Mines Gaspé copper mine (Murdochville) and smelter in the Fall semester. Arrangements are being made for an evening or one day trip to Noranda's Valleyfield zinc refinery, as well as planning for the next Latin America trip. Chapter members on the trip to Nicaragua were given individual grants of $45 each from the Chapter, and it is hoped that a similar arrangement can be made next year. Due to the weak exchange rate it is unlikely that the Chapter will be considering a fieldtrip to the American southwest this year.
Two pieces of news concerning present Chapter members are very gratifying to hear. Ardeshir Hezarkhani's Ph.D. thesis on porphyry copper mineralization in Iran was chosen as the second best thesis submitted to the Canadian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (from a total of 30 entries), and Katherine Ault has been awarded a S.E.G. Hugh E. McKinstry Student Research Grant to study the El Mochito Zn-Pb-Ag deposit in Honduras. Finally, please remember that you are a member of the Chapter, and as such you are welcome to make suggestions at any time regarding potential speakers, or possible field trip locations. It's yours, so be part of it! Sandy Archibald
The Relationship between Industry and Academia
I am delighted to have this opportunity to publicly congratulate the graduate and undergraduate students of our Department in having had the initiative to establish a Student Chapter of the Society of Economic Geologists. McGill University has long regarded itself as a major center of Economic Geology in Canada. Our Department was the first in the country to establish an applied M.Sc. program in mineral exploration and, since the inception of this program in 1956, fully a third of the post-graduate degrees granted in our discipline have been awarded to students graduating from this program.
A large proportion of the graduate students in thesis programs also opt to do their research in economic geology. Indeed at the present time, over 25% of such students are involved in mineral deposits research. Finally, I am proud to report that a majority of our undergraduate students choose to be employed in the mineral industry.
During the past three years, geology departments across the country have been severely hit by budget cuts. Needless to say, this has had a major impact on the ability of our country to educate the future generations of geologists required to serve our society. Particularly affected is the mineral exploration industry, in which our country currently enjoys a world-leading reputation. If Canada is to maintain this position, then it is essential that we continue to educate outstanding young geologists.
An essential component of such an education is for students to have an opportunity to see mining and exploration activities first-hand, to be able to work in these industries as summer students and as graduate students, to be able to work on problems of mutual interest to the exploration industry and to university researchers. Our SEG Student Chapter has become a vital tool in McGill's effort to foster the types of relationships between industry and academia that are required to facilitate the cooperation needed to maintain Canada's position as a world leader in mineral exploration. I look forward to seeing the SEG Chapter go from strength to strength and in so doing ensure McGill's position as the leading center of economic geology in Canada.
SEG Seminar Series
Anatomy of a Giant Kidd ?
The First SEG talk was given on December 4th by Gary de Schutter, a geologist with Falconbridge Limited (Exploration), based in Timmins, Ontario. Gary talked about the Cu-Zn-Ag Kidd Creek volcanogenic massive sulphide (VMS) deposit, and covered a variety of topics pertaining to the deposit. Gary started his talk by outlining a brief history of Falconbridge Limited gave a general overview to the formation of VMS deposits, and Falconbridge's exploration methodology in northern Ontario. The talk then focused on the exploration history in the Timmins area, and results from a number of different techniques (geochemistry and geophysics) were shown. It was by using a combination of these techniques that the Kidd Creek deposit was discovered by Texas Gulf Sulphur Company in 1963 and put into production in 1966.
The rest of Gary's talk concentrated on the geology and occurrence of sulphides within the Kidd Creek deposit. The deposit is of Archean age and contains 150Mt of ore grading 2.55% Cu, 5.17% Zn, and 97 g/t Ag, making it the second largest VMS deposit discovered in Canada (after the Horne Mine, Rouyn-Noranda), but the ore body is still open at depth. Early mining at the deposit was confined to an open pit operation, but since 1972 mining has taken place underground to exploit the 3 massive sulphide lenses found at depth.
The talk was followed by a question period, where SEG members and other members of the audience asked a variety of questions ranging from microscopic details of the ore to Falconbridge's worldwide exploration strategy. Katherine Smuk (VP) proposed the vote of thanks. After the talk Gary invited audience members to view hand samples from Kidd Creek showing the spectacular mineralization.
Raglan, an example of a Proterozoic Komatiite-hosted nickel deposit
Anne Charland, a senior field geologist with Falconbridge Limited (Exploration) based in Laval, Quebec, was the Chapter's second speaker of the year in early April. Anne spoke on Falconbridge's Raglan komatiite-hosted nickel deposit, situated near Cape Smith in the Ungava region of northern Quebec. The talk began with an introduction to komatiites and conditions required to form Cu-Ni deposits within them. Regional geology was set in a plate tectonic framework to show that the Raglan mine area formed in an oceanic setting, and was obducted to form the Cape Smith ophiolite belt during the Paleoproterozoic (~ 2.0 Ga).
Anne explained that the Raglan deposit is composed of several ore bodies and contains reserves of 22 Mt grading 3.06% Ni and 0.87% Cu, thus making it one of the richest komatiite-hosted Ni deposits so-far discovered. The cut off grade at Raglan is 1.5% Ni.
Exploration for additional orebodies in the Raglan area is currently underway and Anne summarized exploration guidelines derived from geological and geophysical data. The ore bodies tend to be steeply dipping to the north and occur within mafic to ultramafic extrusive packages.
As well as the geological aspects of mineral exploration in such a remote location, Anne also talked about the various aspects of building the mine site in northern Quebec. Modules were fabricated in Quebec City and transported up the Labrador Sea on barges, then driven by tracked vehicles to the mine site. With such logistical problems to cope with Falconbridge has turned a difficult nickel property into what will surely be a profitable mine that should produce its first concentrate later this year. Sandy Archibald (Pres.) proposed the vote of thanks.
Nicaragua Fieldtrip
Last year, students and faculty of the Earth and Planetary Sciences Department ventured into the heart of Central America to Nicaragua for their annual field trip. A total of sixteen participants, fourteen undergraduate students (Nicholas Barnes, Rosemarie Gerspacher, Sarah Johnson, Jae Jong (Jane) Kwak, Shawn LaFleur, Sarah Lowman, Mark Nelson, Mati Pouliot, Sylvia Ramirez, Colleen Roche, Oliver Schatz, Mark Spencer, Alex Wills, Johanna Zlotnik) under the supervision of Professor Anthony "Willy, Leadfoot, Monkey-Call, Jacques Villeneuve, Chatterbox" Williams-Jones and Ph.D. student Sandy Archibald spent two pleasurably grueling weeks studying the geology from coast to coast of this calm country.
Upon arrival in the capital of Managua, we spent the afternoon visiting the Geological Survey office to obtain geological maps of Nicaragua. The following morning, we drove south to the town of Masaya to visit our first volcano, Masaya. We had the opportunity to traverse an aa lava flow from the late 1880's, hike down a lava tube and visit the museum of the Volcano Masaya National Park. In collaboration with Glyn Williams-Jones (Open University, UK), we were also able to observe the techniques, such as correlation spectrometry (COSPEC) and Fourier transform infra-red spectrometry (FTIR), used to study the activity of volcanoes, primarily the active Volcan San Fernando.
A visit to the beach was mixed with some relaxing and study of the Tertiary sedimentary strata on the beach cliffs. We even observed trace fossils in some of the outcrops. Another early morning drive brought us to the city of Rivas on the shores of the El Lago de Nicaragua. After an hour-long turbulent boat ride, we arrived at La Isla de Ometepe to examine the ancient petroglyphs on the Cerro Madera volcano. The following day a six hour drive to the north took us to the town of Matagalpa, where we hiked on the mountain to visit the Black Forest, La Selva Negra. We also visited the nearby town of Esteli to see El Salto de Estanzuela. It wasn't too difficult to relax wading in the frigid waters of this waterfall. Driving up toward the Honduran border, we examined the Paleozoic basement while stopping at numerous sedimentary outcrops on the way.
SEG Chapter members who took part in the Nicaragua field-trip, Easter 1998
After the weekend came the first mine visit (El Limón-La India) of the trip near Leon, on the Pacific side of Nicaragua. Operated by the Triton Corporation, we were shown the gold mill, and open pit mine and the underground mine. The mine is of "high sulphidation" type and we were able to observe advanced argillic alteration and vuggy silica within the open pit workings. Production figures of the mine from 1942 until 1996 showed that more than two million ounces of gold had been produced, with another 350,000 delinated by recent exploration. Our guide led us through a complete tour of the gold recovery process.
The next day, we also visited the boiling mud pools at San Jacinto, and the geothermal plant powered by Volcan Momotombo. By mid-week we began our four and a half hour hike up Volcan Momotombo, by Old Leon. It was a difficult climb and not without incident. Upon reaching the crater, Sandy Archibald accompanied by colleagues climbed into the volcanic crater to take gas and sublimate samples. The next day everyone had recovered in time to drive to the centre of Nicaragua to the town of Juigalpa where we had our second mine visit. It was an open pit mine (La Libertad) operated by Greenstone Resources. This mine used cyanide heap leaching of the highly altered auriferous quartz veins and surrounding alteration haloes to extract the 3-4 ppm gold present in the rocks. We were also given a quick tour of the core shack and shown several drill holes samples from the area.
The weekend trip to the Corn Islands on the Carribean coast where we examined the coral reefs was a befitting conclusion to a trip with such unique experiences.
Many thanks to the Triton Corporation and Greenstone Resources for their hospitality and provisions. Additional thanks go out to the following patrons who helped make this trip possible: Cominco Ltd., Glamis Gold Ltd., Kinross Gold Corp.
Five 160,000 ton heap leach pads at Greenstone's La Libertad mine
Balmat-Edwards Fieldtrip
In late January eleven members of the McGill Chapter of the Society of Economic Geologists headed off to the ice storm ravaged St. Lawrence County of New York State. Due the "Ice-storm" in Montreal ten days before, the trip had very nearly been cancelled. The areas of interest for the participants of the trip were the Zinc Corp. of America's Balmat-Edwards zinc-lead mine at Gouverneur, and the tremolite-talc mine operated by Gouverneur Talc, also at Gouverneur.
Due to the large number of undergraduate members in the field trip without a background in mineral deposit studies
Sandy Archibald gave a one hour presentation on the sedimentary exhalative (SEDEX) class of deposit the day before the trip left. SEDEX deposits are regarded as the closest analogue to metamorphosed mineralization within the Balmat district. A very brief introduction on the geology of the Grenville Orogeny was also given.
Our guide for the first part of the field trip was Mr. William deLorraine, mine geologist at the Balmat No. 2 mine. Upon arrival at the mine offices Bill gave us a presentation on the history of mining in the area, and talked about the geological features we would see underground. The mineralization is hosted in a carbonate sequence which was deformed during the Grenville Orogeny (1.1 Ga). The orebodies of the Balmat-Edwards-Pierrepont Zinc mining district rank as world-class deposits, with over 45 million tons of past production plus current reserves, at a grade of 10.1% Zn, 0.3% Pb. The dominant structure in the area is the Sylvia Lake Syncline, with all ore bodies on the southern limb of the fold.
Although the Fowler orebody was not accessible due to blasting restictions we had the opportunity to visit the highly interesting Mud Pond Orebody. While walking to the orebody, the host lithologies to the mineralization were noted, including dolomitic marble, quartzite, talcose diopside, fetid (H2S-rich) and graphitic dolomitic marbles, and anhydrite beds. The anhydrite beds are unusual in that they represent some of the oldest evaporites on Earth, with ages estimated at 1.4 Ga. Some time was spent examing the Mud Pond orebody with participants noting the bedded sulphides (sphalerite, galena and pyrite present). In a recently blasted area, "Durchbewegung" textures were observed. This texture results when sulphides are "milled" and streaked during deformation (akin to mylonitization in silicates) and indicates the proximity of a thrust fault. It was at this point that it came to Bill's attention that blasting in the mine would occur within the next 30 minutes, and we were asked to leave the mine as a safety precaution.
Participants of the trip were (left to right): Alex Wills, John Kreider (Gouverneur Talc, Geologist), Katherine Smuk (V.P.), Katherine Ault, Glenn Poirier, Nick Barnes (Treas.) Iain Chartrand, John Carey, Fredric Leclerc, Marc Spencer, Dave Mapp. Not present in photograph, Sandy Archibald (Pres.)
Once on the surface we were invited to visit the mill were the ore is processed. The party saw the different types of ball and rod mills where the ore is reduced in size after being crushed. The ore is then washed with surfactants which produce hydrophobic or hydrophilic conditions, and aerated to produce a froth from which the zinc and, at a later stage lead, are removed. This froth is then dried to form a concentrate. The lead concentrate is shipped to Ohio to be smelted, while the zinc concentrate is taken by rail to Noranda's Valleyfield (near Montreal) smelter. A quick trip to the remaining ore pile was made to collect samples from some of the other orebodies, before Bill gave a quick slide show to illustrate features we didn't have time to see at the Fowler orebody.
On Saturday morning John Kreider from the Gouverneur Talc Company (a division of R.T. Vanderbilt Companies Inc.) welcomed the Chapter members to the mine office and gave the group a tour of the mine facilities. John started off by summarizing of the geology of the Governeur area, and placed particular emphasis on the carbonate and evaporite rocks in the region. The significance of these evaporites is the fact that they released vast amounts of water during metamorphism and thus produced the X-CO2 conditions required to form tremolite and talc in the area. John explained that the main commodities mined in the area were talc, tremolite, and wollastonite, with "end product" uses in the paint, ceramics and plastics industries. Previously these minerals were extracted from numerous small open pit and underground operations, but in recent years the company has concentrated on fewer and large pits.
Observing some of the relationships in the field was difficult. This was due to the several centimeters of ice and fresh snow that had covered the pits. Normally the snow would not have been a problem at that time of year, but again because of the ice storm, mining operations had been halted in the last few weeks. The halting of the work had caused the accumulation of snow, which would have been removed by the blasting and normal mining operations. Nevertheless, excellent samples of talc, tremolite, wollastonite, and hexinite (a rare Mn-rich amphibole) were obtained. John also invited the Chapter back at a later date when there was less snow on the ground.
The McGill Student Chapter would like to extend its gratitude to Bill deLorraine and John Kreider for their help in facilitating the visit to their establishments, especially in the days following the aftermath of the ice storm.
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