Standing room only at GSWA Goldfields open day

Major geological projects presented at regional open day
Date: Monday, 18 December 2017

Local Goldfields’ geologists and industry representatives were out in force last month at the Department of Mines, Industry Regulation and Safety's (DMIRS) Geological Survey of Western Australia’s (GSWA) regional open day in Kalgoorlie.

DMIRS GSWA Executive Director Dr Rick Rogerson said the event was well attended and the talks were very well received.

In the morning, using excellent facilities available at the Goldfields Institute of Technology, GSWA provided hands-on training to prospectors and company geologists in the use of DMIRS’ online systems such as GeoVIEW.WA.

“At the Kalgoorlie Core Library, GSWA experts explained features of core from the Kambalda stratigraphy, the Black Swan nickel deposit and the Lake Raeside impact structure” he said.

“Most of the geologists were interested in KD1, which is Western Mining Corporation’s (WMC) Kambalda nickel discovery hole from the 1960s and one person arrived straight from her shift, just as we were closing, to specifically view this historic core.”

Dr Rogerson said the day ended with three talks at the Hannans Club as part of the Raglan Drilling Geology Lecture Series and staff presented the latest thinking on some of GSWA’s major geological projects in the Eastern Goldfields.

“The delegates appeared particularly interested in the ‘Provenance fingerprinting of gold nuggets from the Kurnalpi Goldfield’, as it’s the first time we’ve released the information publically,” he said.

“The talk on the effort to ‘barcode’ the Goldfields’ stratigraphy using high-quality geochemical analyses of available drill core was also well received.”

To round up the evening GSWA Project Manager, Stephen Wyche, was given a plaque mounted with drill core in recognition of his impending retirement and his significant contribution to the department’s understanding of the Eastern Goldfields geology.

The next opportunity to hear about Western Australia’s geology and the many products GSWA have released during the past 12 months is at the GSWA Open Day on 23 February 2018 at the Esplanade Hotel in Fremantle.

Full event details, including the presentation program for the day, will be available on the department’s website in the new year. The event in Fremantle costs $110 and online registration is available at www.dmp.wa.gov.au/gswa2018 .