Abstract: Gold-bearing, arsenic-rich pyrite in association with enriched As, Sb and minor Ag is found in two separate mineralization styles at Kaminak Gold Corp.’s Coffee Gold Project, Yukon. Arsenian pyrite replaces primary metamorphic mica by sulphidizing Fe in the host, while pervasive dolomite-illite alteration destroys the host and eventually consumes early mineralized pyrite. Silicification of host rocks is observed with associated arsenian pyrite deposition due to cooling. Brecciation of silicified intervals by coarse grained hydrothermal quartz occurs later with additional pyrite deposition. Mineralized intervals are oxidized by late, meteoric fluids which consume Au-bearing pyrite and release micron-scale free gold from the pyrite crystal lattice into the remnant oxides. Sulphidized biotite within the 98 Ma Coffee Creek Granite constrains mineralization to <98 Ma. Similar metal associations (Au-As-Sb vs. Au-As-Sb-Pb-Zn-Cu) suggest Coffee potentially represents the shallower, epizonal extension of the mesozonal orogenic Boulevard gold deposit, with a late epithermal overprint.

Authors: Buitenhuis, E., Boyce L. and Finnigan, C.

NTS Mapsheet(s): 115J14

Citation: Buitenhuis, E., Boyce, L. and Finnigan, C., 2015. Advances in the mineralization styles and petrogenesis of the Coffee gold deposit, Yukon. In: Yukon Exploration and Geology 2014, K.E. MacFarlane, M.G. Nordling and P.J. Sack (eds.), Yukon Geological Survey, p. 29.43

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