Horseshoe Lights Mine, Peak Hill Mining District, Meekatharra Shire, Western Australia, Australiai

Regional Level Types
Horseshoe Lights Mine	Mine
Peak Hill Mining District	Mining District
Meekatharra Shire	Shire
Western Australia	State
Australia	Country

The Horseshoe Lights deposit was discovered in 1946 by a prospector. From that time to 1987 it had various owners, 1988-1991 Barrick and 1992-1994 Sabminco when mining ceased. Up to this time it produced 300 000 oz of gold and 54 000 tonnes of copper. Silver is also found in minor amounts.

The mine is located 34 kilometres north of Peak Hill and 150 kilometres north of Meekatharra, on the western side of the Horseshoe Range (named after the shape it makes in the landscape).

The deposit is hosted by the palaeoproterozoic Glengarry Sub-Basin within the Nabberu Basin. Mineralisation is in the upper part of the Narracoota Volcanics of tholeiitic basalt grading up to Mg basalt. Below this is the Thaduna Greywacke of greywacke with subordinate mudstone, and an upper unit of sandstone, grit and conglomerate.

The top of the Narracoota Volcanic is weakly metamorphosed volcaniclastics of quartz-chlorite schist, quartz eye tuffs and altered volcanics, capped by a prominent 1-2 metre thick poorly bedded chert/banded iron formation, with magnetite, specular hematite, and gold associated with pyrite.

The intermediate host is a suite of green, fine grained quartz-chlorite schist, quartz-sericite,quartz-kaolin schist, quartz-eye schist, with scattered 1-10cm thick chert bands. The main orebody is a series of lenses and pods, fragmented by shearing, containing quartz-hematite-goethite gossan with an average width of 20 metres, 50-200 metres strike length and 50 metres thick. The gossan contains high gold, although below 100 metres chalcocite, digenite, and covellite is dominant, above the primary minerals of pyrite and lesser chalcopyrite. To the east and west are veins and blebs of chalcopyrite-pyrite in the footwall and hanging wall.

The ore body is an enriched gossanous zone, steep dipping, lens shaped series of shoots, with high gold grades at the centre of the body, decreasing towards the margins.

Other Regions, Features and Areas containing this locality

References