Bootu Creek Manganese Mine, Muckaty Station, Barkly Region, Northern Territory, Australiai

Regional Level Types
Bootu Creek Manganese Mine	Mine
Muckaty Station	Station (farming)
Barkly Region	Region
Northern Territory	Territory
Australia	Country

The Bootu Creek Manganese Mine is 110 kilometres north of Tennant Creek, and 10 kilometres east of the Stuart Highway. The mine workings form a south pointing U shape, with the eastern side the Bootu Creek mine, and western side the Muckaty mine, which will be listed separately (sometimes spelt Mucketty or Muckatty). The Bootu mine site contains a processing plant, several buildings, tailings pond, residential camp, and airstrip. Ore is trucked 60 kilometres west to a railway siding, then railed to Darwin for export. There are several named pits at Bootu including Gogo, Shekuma, Gala, Chugga, Pygmy, and Masai.

The manganese forms a prominent dark escapement, in contrast to the laterite escarpments of the district. It had been known for many decades, but few showed an interest, until manganese was needed for the Rum Jungle uranium plant. Doyle and Farlow pegged the lease in 1954, and mining of manganese occurred at the Muckaty deposit from 1955 to 1963.

OM Holdings was formed in 1994 by a Singaporean engineer. Mining at Bootu Creek started in 2005. The mine was upgraded in 2009, with a thirteen year expected life. Resources estimated in 2013 were 12.5 Mt @ 20.9%Mn. In 2015, the mine closed due to low manganese prices, throwing 140 employees out of work.

On the eastern rim of the Masai pit was a culturally significant site. The rocky outcrop represented the Bilgara and Kaladaku ancestor spirits of the marsupial mouse and bandicoot. They had a fight over bush tucker, with blood spilt, staining the rocks red, associated with the manganese.

The company had been warned by the government to avoid the area. However they developed pits completely surrounding and to the base of the outcrop. Blasted caused cracks in the outcrop in 2011, but work continued, and it eventually slid into the pit. The company was fined $150,000 for desecration of a sacred site. This equates to the cost of one to two haulpak tyres. Executive director of the company, Peter Toth, stated they had no intention to destroy the site, and he was heart broken (although not enough for the company not to contest the court case).

The manganese can be traced as discontinuous black ridges for 24 kilometres of the Bootu Formation, in the nose of a shallowly north north-west plunging Bootu Syncline. There are six named deposits being Muckaty and Muckaty 2 on the western side, and Bootu 1, 2, 4 and 5 on the eastern flank of the syncline. Bootu 4 is also known as Deposit E, or Redwing.

The lower Bootu Formation is 150 to 250 metres thick, as a cyclic mixed siliclastic carbonate succession. The sandstone shows ripple marks, desiccation features, and halite pseudomorphs, and is interbedded with dolomitic siltstone and dololutite, some stromatolitic. The mineral seams show high grade manganese decreasing with depth. The seams are 2 to 6 metres thick, of cryptomelane, with pyrolusite seams, and minor manganite in the richest areas. More geology information is under the Muckaty Manganese mine heading.

Other Regions, Features and Areas containing this locality

References