largest mineralised carbonatites in the world, page-4

With all this mention of world class deposits i decided to do some research. Now i am by no means a geologist and all of this information has been sourced from a USGS spreadsheet and perhaps a geologist on the forum may care to shed some light.

However my point is simple, when comparing Ngualla with the prominent "World Class" carbonatite deposits it becomes apparent that these minerals are not showing up by fluke. There are distinct similarites in the age and type of rock formations and ore bodies that make up these deposits. Below are a couple of real 'world class' deposits for comparison.

Location: Bayan Obo (Baotou), China, Inner Mongolia 41-45N 109-58E

Tonnage & Grade: 750 Mt @ 4.1% REO; 48 Mt @ 6% REO, 15000 Mt @ 35% Fe; 800 Mt @ 6% REO (1990); 36 Mt REO

Age: Middle Proterozoic -1580 Ma

REE Mineralogy: bas, mon, aes, all, apa, par, hua, ferg, fers, xen, daq, cor, ccer, che, bri

Other Ore or Significant Minerals: mag, hem, flu, apa, bar, Nb-rut, col, mrt, pyro, pyr, ana

Gangue and Rock-forming Minerals: dol, qtz, cal, fld, arf, phlo,aeg, rie, bio.

Location: Mountain Pass USA California 35-29N 115-32W

Tonnage: Proven + probable-- 29 Mt @ 8.9% REO (5% cutoff); >40 Mt @ 7.68% REO; 28 Mt @ 8.86% REO; 28.1 @ 12% bas or 8.9% REO (1989); 90 Mt @ 5% REO

Age:Proterozoic-- 1400 Ma

REE Mineralogy: bas, par, mon, sah, all, crt

Other ore or significant minerals: bar, sid, Sr-bar, Ba-cel, tit, mag, hem, gal, pyr, cpy, tet, mal, azu, crs, wul, flu, str, apa, thor

Gangue and Rock Forming Minerals: cal, dol, ank, qtz, croc, chl, bio, phlo, musc, talc, aeg, goe, arag

Location: Ngualla, Tanzania 7-42S 32-50E

Tonnage:?

Age:Proterozoic

REE Mineralogy: par, mon

Other or or significant minerals: apa, mag, bar, flu, pyro, sulfides, dia

Gangue and Rock Forming Minerals: dol, bio, musc, cal, qtz

Also a note from the USGS on Ngualla confirming a phosphate resource: Magnetite-apatite veins ama 20 m wide and several hundred meters long contain 12-35% P2O5.

The key LYC deposit of Mt Weld is also on this list and it to has key formations and minerals in line with the above listed deposits.

Sorry for such a long post but i just wanted to point out the key similarites between this and PROVEN 'world class' deposits to confirm that we are well and truly in the game at this point and the signs are there. Now bring on those drill results to confirm!

Good luck to all and may your patience be rewarded!