Wah Wah Summit Mining District, Beaver County, Utah, USAi

Regional Level Types
Wah Wah Summit Mining District	Mining District
Beaver County	County
Utah	State
USA	Country

The Wah Wah Summit mining district is in the Wah Wah Mountains of north-central Beaver County about 30 mi west-northwest of Milford. The district includes two Fe prospects but has no reported production; however, the West claim may have shipped some test lots of Fe ore (Bullock, 1970).
The Wah Wah Mountains are a large, northerly trending range in the east-central Basin and Range Province. The Wah Wah Summit district is on a major pass in the Wah Wah Mountains. The pass is underlain by a series of three small, east-west- trending Oligocene stocks (~30 Ma) intruded into a package of Cambrian carbonate rocks. The stocks are grossly similar to the Cactus stock in the San Francisco mining district 10 mi to the east across Wah Wah Valley. The Wah Wah Mountains were rotated slightly to the east during Basin and Range extension, resulting in gently east-dipping (5°–15°) Oligocene volcanic rocks on the east flank of the range. Erickson (1966) describes the intrusives as diorites having as much as 25% mafic minerals and magnetite-bearing, but could locally be classified as monzonites due to the high K-spar content. He notes that the western (older) stock has pyroxenes and less albitic plagioclase. In contrast, the eastern (younger) stock has more hydrous minerals including amphibole and biotite instead of pyroxene, has more quartz and K-spar, more albitic plagioclase, and is also more altered, brecciated, and pyritized. The stocks have a wide, bleached, coarse-grained marble halo, up to 2000 ft wide, with the narrowest marble zone on the western stock. The marble zone is widest on the north side of all the stocks. Locally narrow, brown, anhydrous grossularite-chlorite-diopside-vesuvianite skarns lie adjacent to the stocks (Erickson, 1966).
The two prospects explored some small Fe skarns (USGS Model 18D) developed in marbleized Cambrian carbonate rocks north of the western stock (Bullock, 1970). The mineralization occurs along northerly trending faults and consists of fissure filling and replacement of limonite, hematite, or a mixture of the two minerals. The mineralization occurs as either hard clinker chunks or soft ocherous gouge. The West claim is the larger of the two and has been developed by a 30-ft-deep shaft that has a short drift to the north in the mineralized fault zone. Ore samples from the two prospects run 46% Fe from the West claim and 57.6% Fe from the eastern Red claim (Bullock, 1970). The ores are also weakly anomalous in As, V, and Zn.
A portion of the Wah Wah district is within the U.S. Bureau of Land Management Wah Wah Mountain Wilderness Study Area.