The Ore Deposits of the South-east Missouri Cobalt-Copper-Lead-Zinc District - Mineralogy, Ore Textures, Applied Mineralogy and Ore Controls

Abstract

The south-east Missouri cobalt-copper-lead-zinc district is the world's largest lead producer and a significant producer of by-product zinc, copper, cobalt, silver and cadmium. Current production in the district comes from six or seven mines in the Viburnum Trend. Most ores in the Viburnum Trend are characterised by a small number of minerals with simple compositions. Portions of some orebodies contain ores that exhibit greater variations in mineralogy, and these include shale-hosted leadcopper ores, bornite ores and nickel-arsenic sulfide ores. Ore textures include both replacement and open space filling textures, and the paragenetic sequence for the ores is characterised by repetitive periods of deposition of all of the ore and gangue minerals. Ore microscopy is an effective tool for not only the identification of the minerals and textures shown by the ores, but also to determine the mineralogy and textures responsible for beneficiation problems. An interesting variety of sedimentary and structural ore controls have determined the locations of individual orebodies in the district. Based upon the positions of orebodies with respect to Precambrian ridges and knobs, together with areal patterns of mineral/metal zoning, it is interpreted that the ore fluids came from diverse directions to form the deposits in the district. It is concluded that the Old Lead Belt subdistrict was mineralised by fluids that flowed from the north-east and north-west, the Fredericktown area by fluids from the north-east, the Indian Creek subdistrict by fluids from the north-west and the Viburnum Trend by fluids from the north-west and west.

Meeting Name

9th International Congress for Applied Mineralogy (2008: Sep. 8-10, Brisbane, Australia)

Department(s)

Geosciences and Geological and Petroleum Engineering

Keywords and Phrases

Arsenic; Cadmium; Cobalt; Cobalt Deposits; Concentration (process); Copper; Copper Deposits; Copper Lead Deposits; Copper Lead Zinc Deposits; Crystallography; Forestry; Land Use; Lead; Lead Deposits; Lead Zinc Deposits; Lithology; Mineralogy; Ore Deposit Geology; Ore Deposits; Ores; Silver; Silver Deposits; Sulfide Minerals; Textures; Transition Metals; Zinc; Zinc Deposits; Arsenic Sulfides; Current Productions; Effective Tools; Gangue Minerals; Lead Producers; Missouris; Open Spaces; Ore Controls; Ore Fluids; Precambrian; Minerals

Geographic Coverage

Southeast Missouri

International Standard Book Number (ISBN)

978-1920806873

Document Type

Article - Conference proceedings

Document Version

Citation

File Type

text

Language(s)

English

Rights

© 2008 Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy, All rights reserved.

Publication Date

01 Sep 2008

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