Deep Star Deposit

The Deep Star Deposit is a gold mine located in Eureka county, Nevada at an elevation of 5,906 feet.

About the MRDS Data:

All mine locations were obtained from the USGS Mineral Resources Data System. The locations and other information in this database have not been verified for accuracy. It should be assumed that all mines are on private property.

Mine Info

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Site Name

Primary: Deep Star Deposit

Commodity

Primary: Gold
Secondary: Silver

Location

State: Nevada
County: Eureka
District: Carlin Trend

Land Status

Land ownership: BLM Administrative Area
Note: the land ownership field only identifies whether the area the mine is in is generally on public lands like Forest Service or BLM land, or if it is in an area that is generally private property. It does not definitively identify property status, nor does it indicate claim status or whether an area is open to prospecting. Always respect private property.
Administrative Organization: Elko Administrative District

Holdings

Not available

Workings

Not available

Ownership

Owner Name: Newmont Gold Co. (Newmont Mining Corp.)
Percent: 100.0
Home Office: Colorado
Info Year: 1996

Production

Year: 1995
Description: Gold Production 2800 T Oz/Yr Gold

Deposit

Record Type: Site
Operation Category: Producer
Deposit Type: replacement
Operation Type: Surface-Underground
Discovery Year: 1989
Years of Production:
Organization:
Significant: Y
Deposit Size: S

Physiography

Not available

Mineral Deposit Model

Model Name: Sediment-hosted Au

Orebody

Form: tabular

Structure

Type: R
Description: Deep Star lies along the Tuscarora Spur, a north-trending antiform.

Type: L
Description: Deep Star lies 1000 ft. south of the Goldstrike intrusive and along the southern extension of the NW-trending Post fault system. The primary structural orientation associated with ore formation at Deep Star is N20W.

Alterations

Alteration Type: L
Alteration Text: Alteration comments: propylitization, argillization, silicification. Argillization is the dominant alteration type and occurs as a halo to the mineralized zone, and with quartz through the gold-rich zones. Silica is present in a variety of forms, including replacements, veins, stockworks and breccias, reflecting multiple periods of silicification. Silicification is not a simple quartz flooding, but is found as a quartz-kaolinite-sericite alteration.

Rocks

Name: Diorite
Role: Associated
Age Type: Associated Rock
Age in Years: 158.000000+-
Age Young: Late Jurassic

Name: Carbonate
Role: Host
Age Type: Host Rock
Age Young: Devonian

Analytical Data

Not available

Materials

Ore: Gold

Comments

Comment (Geology): Geology comments: sedimentary rocks are cut by a myriad of dikes and sills of the Goldstrike intrusive. Emplacement of the intrusive has resulted in contact metamorphism and metasomatism generating a complex package of hornfels, marble, exoskarn, and endoskarn. The gold-bearing hydrothermal system was superimposed on this environment at the intrusive-sedimentary rock contact. The Deep Star deposit has a geochemical signature similar to many Carlin-type systems but with an exceptionally high Au:Ag ratio.

Comment (Identification): This record supersedes record # RE00283 from which all pertinent information has been extracted.

Comment (Workings): underground workings below older surface workings

Comment (Commodity): Ore Materials: gold

Comment (Development): Newmont's discovery hole at Deep Star was drilled in mid-1989, and intersected 205 ft at an average grade of 0.941 opt Au between 1300 and 1505 ft. Subsequent drilling has outlined a mineralized body containing more than one million ounces of gold in ore with an average grade of nearly one ounce per ton. In 2004 a major exploration focus is underground drilling along the Deep Post/Deep Star corridor, a mile-long drift connecting these two high-grade underground mines.

Comment (Economic Factors): The pre-mine resource for the Deep Star deposit was listed in 2002 as 1.7 million ounces of gold, in ore with an average grade of nearly one ounce per ton. In its 2005 Annual Report , Newmont Mining Corp. announced that reserves at the Carlin Underground Operations aggregate 7,700,000 tons @ 0.490 opt Au proven+probable.

References

Reference (Deposit): Newmont website, 2004.

Reference (Deposit): Long, K.R., DeYoung, J.H., Jr., and Ludington, S.D., 1998, Database of significant deposits of gold, silver, copper, lead, and zinc in the United States; Part A, Database description and analysis; part B, Digital database: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 98-206, 33 p., one 3.5 inch diskette.

Reference (Deposit): Bureau of Land Management, 1991, Draft Environmental Impact Statement, Betze Project.

Reference (Deposit): Harvey, B. A. and Clode, C. H., 1992, Geology and Gold Mineralization at the Deep Star Deposit, Eureka County, Nevada, abstract in Geological Society of Nevada Newsletter, November.

Reference (Deposit): Chris H. Clode, Steven R. Grusing, Ivan M. Johnston, and Dean G. Heitt, 2002 ,Geology of the Deep Star Gold Deposit, in NBMG Bull 111.

Nevada Gold

Nevada has a total of 368 distinct gold districts. Of the of those, just 36 are major producers with production and/or reserves of over 1,000,000 ounces, 49 have production and/or reserves of over 100,000 ounces, with the rest having less than 100,000 ounces. Read more: Gold Districts of Nevada.