Chagi Volcanic-Plutonic Arc
Chagi Volcanic-Plutonic Arc
Chagi Volcanic-Plutonic Arc
A group of very Late- or post-Cretaceous sills (with some lenticular masses and dykes),
several hundred metres thick, form many high ridges in the Saindak area b@cause of their
resistant nature. Named as Tanki sills, they stretchNW-SE for some 55 km and can be used
as a marker horizon (HSC 1960). They are wade up of andesite porphyry containing abundant
phenocrysts of plagioclase and augite in-:a very fine-grained to microlitic groundmass. The
sills may be vesicular near the top, and columnar structure is well-developed at places.
Chloritisation and saussuritisation have variably affected the rocks.
An earlier group of tonalites, quartz diorites and diorites was em.placed about 20 to 21 Ma
ago (K-Ar hornblende and biotite ages: Sillitoe and Khan 1977), and intrudes the nearly
horizontal beds of Amalaf Formation near Saindak. The intrusions form many small
(<l km 2 ) stocks and associated dykes and sills. The Saindak copper deposit is associated
with three closely-spaced tonalite porphyry stocks around a parent stock (20 Ma age).
These possess abundant phenocrysts of quartz, medium plagioclase, biotite, and up to
10 mm long hornblende, in a fine-grained groundmass of the same minerals and, locally,
minor K-feldspar. The hornblende porphyries are· commonly altered and contain secondary
albite, epidote, chlorite ± calcite. There also are uniformly fine-grained quartz diorites
containing andesine, hornblende, and 5-10% quartz. Around some of the stocks, there are
several-kilometres broad zones of albite-epidote (locally hornblende) facies hornfelses
(Ahmed et al. 1972).
· . A l�rge number of dykes and sills of hornblende andesite porphyry are associated with
the s..h1cks but there also are a few quartz diorite porphyry dykes that post-date the early
phase· of copper mineralisation. Dykes of other compositions have been described: aplites
cutting the tonalite porphyry predate weathering and mineralisation, and dacite porphyry
containing quartz, hornblende and plagioclase emplaced during mineralisation. Very in
teresting in the Saindak area are local occurrences of near vertical dykes up to 12 m thick
and trendingNNE to N. To the north of the Saindak Fault, the swarms occur in aN-S zone
measuring 2,500 x 250 m (Fig. 6.16: Sillitoe and Khan 1977). There appears to have been
a long pause in the magmatic activity until Quaternary or, possibly, Late Pliocene,
discussed at the end of this chapter.