Unnamed Occurrences (ARDF - PE010; near Kane Peak), Kupreanof Mining District, Petersburg Borough, Alaska, USAi

Regional Level Types
Unnamed Occurrences (ARDF - PE010; near Kane Peak)	- not defined -
Kupreanof Mining District	Mining District
Petersburg Borough	Borough
Alaska	State
USA	Country

Location: This well known mafic-ultramafic body is about 13 miles north-northwest of Petersburg. The body is a slightly elongate pluton about two and a half square miles in area that extends from just east of Kane Peak northeast to exposures for about a mile along the shoreline southeast of Cape Strait. The coordinates are approximately at the center of the body. This site is locality 16 and 17 of Grybeck, Berg, and Karl (1984). It is commonly informally referred to as the Kane Peak deposit or the Kane Peak ultramafic complex.
Geology: Kane Peak is a classic 'zoned' or Alaska-type mafic-ultramafic complex with a dunite-wherlite (olivine-clinopyroxenite peridotite) core bordered by a hornblendite shell about 300 feet thick. (The foregoing description is based mainly on Himmelberg and Loney, 1995; but also see Walton, 1951; Taylor, 1967; and Taylor and Noble, 1969, for earlier interpretations of this and other Alaska-type bodies in southeastern Alaska.) About 80% of the body is dunite and wehrlite that grade into each other. Small-scale cumulus layering is present but the body is poorly exposed and its overall structure is uncertain. The body probably has steeply dipping contacts and extends under Frederick Sound to the northeast for a half mile or more (Brew, 1997). The mafic-ultramafic complex intrudes metamorphosed pelite of the Jurassic or Cretaceous Semour Canal Formation and is bordered to the northwest and and south by Cretaceous migmatite. The Kane Peak complex has been dated at 93.4 to 102.0 Ma by K-Ar methods. Pyrrhotite, pentlandite, and chalcopyrite are sporadically disseminated through the peridotite; sparse disseminated chromite occurs widely in the dunite; and the hornblendite locally contains titaniferous magnetite. Himmelberg and Loney (1995) provide trace metal content of several metals including Co, Ni, and Cr. Still and others (2002) collected samples at several localities. Analyses of samples collected along the shoreline showed nothing of interest. A stream-sediment sample from a stream on the northeast side of Kane Peak contained 124 parts per billion (ppb) platinum, and two samples from a malachite-stained outcrop on the south-facing slope of the east ridge contained 1,954 and 2,2078 parts per million copper, 113 and 78 ppb platinum, and 180 and 83 ppb palladium.
Workings: In 1960, two claims were staked for iron on the body along the coast near Cape Strait, probably on magnetite-bearing hornblendite that crops out there (U. S. Bureau of Mines, 1980). In addition, the Kane Peak body has repeatedly been visited by geologists over the years as a potential site for Fe, Cu, and Pt-group deposits and for its scientific value. With the possible exception of the claims staked for Fe along Frederick Sound, there is little evidence at present (2007) of anything close to an economic deposit in the complex.
Age: Late to Early Cretaceous based on 93.4 to 102.0 Ma, K-Ar age dates (Himmelberg and Loney, 1995).

Commodities (Major) - Cr, Cu, Fe, Pt-group
Development Status: No
Deposit Model: Zoned or Alaska-type ultramafic complex with disseminated, magmatic sulfides a

Other Databases

Link to USGS - Alaska:	PE010

Other Regions, Features and Areas containing this locality

References