Century Zn deposit–the world’s largest meteorite impacted orebody

Summary

We describe how the world-class Proterozoic Century zinc deposit in northwest Queensland has been sculptured by an Ordovician meteorite impact, the Lawn Hill Impact Structure. The deposit is located at the SW edge of the crater, is dismembered by crater-related faults and is overlain by breccias (suevite) related to fall-back and resurge processes into the crater. Using drilling and newly acquired IP data, we interpret a five-fold thickening of slumped Cambrian carbonate breccias in the crater, to a depth of 600 m. The Century deposit is known to have been larger than has been so far discovered. A restoration of the post-ore faults and Zn:Pb metal ratios of the mined Northern and Southern ore blocks, indicates an original enlarged form of the world-class deposit and that parts of the orebody may have spalled into the Cambrian-filled crater. This points to significant discovery potential in an otherwise intensely explored, near-mine setting.

• Century zinc deposit
• meteorite impact structure
• suevite breccias
• post-ore faults