Cantung Mine, Tungsten (Cantung), Mackenzie Mountains, Northwest Territories, Canadai

Regional Level Types
Cantung Mine	Mine
Tungsten (Cantung)	Town
Mackenzie Mountains	Mountain Range
Northwest Territories	Territory
Canada	Country

A tungsten mine with exoskarn mineralization, located very close to the border of Yukon & Northwest Territories. Two orebodies (Pit ore body (depleted) and the E-Zone ore body).
Owned by the Canada Tungsten Mining Corp. Mined 1962-1986.

"The Cantung Mine closed in May 1986, and the townsite was closed. A year or two later, the telephone exchange, with only a handful of active lines on obsolescent electromechanical equipment, was shut down. Although the mine reopened in 2002, the nature of the mine had changed so that there was no longer an operating townsite with families. The mine closed again in 2003. Following an investment by the Yukon based Kaska Dena Council in December 2004 the mine was reopened in 2005." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tungsten,_Northwest_Territories)

High-grade quartz-scheelite veins (up to 3.7 wt.% WO3) in the open pit orebody of the Cantung mine,Tungsten, Northwest Territories occur 300 m vertically above a Cambrian limestone-Cretaceous monzogranite contact along which the E-Zone, a world-class tungsten skarn orebody, is developed. The trend of an 80 m wide vein swarm is roughly parallel to the strike and dip of a near-vertical aplite dyke along the edge of the open pit. Adjacent to these quartz-scheelite veins, dark green alteration selvedges overprint earlier light green skarn alteration. This overprint implies that the high-grade quartz-scheelite veins are not part of the early skarn-forming event but represent a distinct, later event. The high-grade quartz-scheelite veins are thought to be related to a deep magmatic hydrothermal system and are likely a distal expression of a protracted skarn-forming event, perhaps related to aplite dyke emplacement.

Other Regions, Features and Areas containing this locality

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