Chino Mine (Santa Rita pit; Santa Rita Mine), Santa Rita, Santa Rita Mining District, Grant County, New Mexico, USAi

Regional Level Types
Chino Mine (Santa Rita pit; Santa Rita Mine)	Mine (Active)
Santa Rita	Town (Former)
Santa Rita Mining District	Mining District
Grant County	County
New Mexico	State
USA	Country

A porphyry Cu-Mo-Au-Ag-PGE-Pb deposit/mine located in secs. 26, 27, 34 & 35, T017S, R12W, NMM.

Comprised of two open-pit mines (North pit and South pit) and includes the Groundhog, Pewabic, and Empire skarn occurrences.

There is leachable oxide and secondary sulfide mineralization, and millable primary sulfide mineralization. The predominant oxide copper mineral is chrysocolla. Chalcocite is the most important secondary copper sulfide mineral, and chalcopyrite and molybdenite the dominant primary sulfides.

Originally mined by Native Americans and later by Spaniards. The open-pit mine began production in 1910. The original concentrator went into operation in 1911 but was replaced by a new facility in 1982. A smelter was commissioned in 1939 and was modernized in 1985 to increase capacity and achieve compliance with the Clean Air Act. In 2005, the smelter was permanently closed.

Structure: Santa Rita Stock, Complex Network Of Faults Deposit Lies In A Horst Bound On The West By The NW-Trending Silver City Fault And On The East By The NW-Trending Mimbres Fault. Sediments Within The Horst Are Synclinal And Domed By Intrusives.

Alteration: See Comments

Tectonics: Continental Magmatic Arc

Commodity: Supergene Minerals Are Chalcocite, Covellite, Native Copper, Chrysocolla, Cuprite, Malachite, And Azurite. Primary Minerals (Replacement Deposits) Are Chalcopyrite And Magnetite. Primary Minerals (Porphyry) Are Chalcopyrite, Bornite, And Molybdenite.

Deposit: Ore Bodies At Santa Rita Are A Complex Of Typical Porphyry Type Veins And Disseminated Ores That Have Been Secondarily Enriched, And Limestone Replacement Deposits Exhibiting Little Or No Enrichment, In And Around The Pervasively Altered And Intensely Shattered Santa Rita Stock. The Supergene Enriched Zone, Which Provided Much Of The Early-Mined Ore, Occurred Chiefly In The Stock And Peripheral Upper Cretaceous Sedimentary Rocks And Quartz Diorite Sills Where Locally It Is More That 200 M Thick. Replacement (Skarn) Ores Occur Mainly In Penn And Emiss Limestone Of The Lake Valley, Oswaldo, And Syrena Formations, With Less Pervasive Mineralization In Ord And Sil Montoya And Fusselman Dolomites. Skarn Occurs Along The N And NW Border Of The Stock. Protore Grade Is 0.2% Copper. This Record Contains Data From Record D011550 By Ron Worl Which Has Been Deleted From Mrds. ; Info.Src : 1 Pub Lit; 2 Unpub Rept This Record Includes Data From Mrds Record No D000578 By Robert U. King, 74 08, Which Has Been Deleted. Open Pit Mining At Chino Has Destroyed Or Covered Over Many Small, Older Workings, Including Flux, Keystone, Wildcat, Ivanhoe, Treasure Vault, Tourmaline, Humboldt, Copper Queen, Ninety, Romero, And Carrasco (Hearst) Associated Minerals: actinolite, alunite, anhydrite, biotite, bornite, chalcocite, chalcopyrite, chlorite, copper, cuprite, enargite, epidote, galena, garnet, gold, hematite/specularite, kaolinite, magnetite, marcasite, molybdenite, montmorillonite, pyrite, rutile, sericite, siderite, sphalerite, zeolite Associated Rocks: breccia, granodiorite porphyry, hornfels, jasper, quartz diorite porphyry, quartz monzonite porphyry, skarn;andesite, andesite breccia, basalt, conglomerate, diorite porphyry, dolomite, gneiss, quartz latite, quartz latite porphyry, rhyolite, rhyolite tuff, sandstone, schist;latite, limestone, marble, quartzite, shale

Deposit type: Porphyry Cu, skarn-related

Development: Patent The Mine Was Refused On The Grounds That It Was Still Owned By The Heirs Of Elguea; Operations Were Abandoned In 1871. In 1872 The Mine Was Relocated By Fresh And Magruder Who Sold Their Claim To Hayes In 1873. Hayes' Application For A Patent Was Also Denied, But He Found The Elguea Heirs And Purchased The Mine Later In 1873. In 1880, Hayes Sold Out To Whitney Who Enlarged His Holdings And Built A 40-Stamp Mill And Smelter, Sank The Romero Shaft To 500 Ft Depth, And Did Some Diamond Drilling 1882 To 1884. Operations Were Divided Between The Bonanza Development Co. And The Santa Rita Copper And Iron Co. The Mine Was Optioned For Two Years By The Hearst Estate In 1897 Which Built A 100 Tpd Mill In That Year. Development Work Located A High-Grade Sulfide Ore Body, The Option Was Exercised And The Santa Rita Copper Mining Co. Formed In 1899 To Develop The Mine. In 1902, The 300 Ft Carrasco Shaft Cut Part Of The Supergene-Enriched Blanket Deposit. Exploration Continued To 1906, During And After Which The Old Workings And Dumps Were Worked By Lessees. The Chino Copper Co. Acquired Title In 1909 And Began Stripping For An Open Pit Mine In 1910. By 1911, 467 Churn Drill Holes, 182,000 Cumulative Feet Drilling, Had Developed About 55 Million St Of 2.24% Cu Ore. The Hurley Mill Began Operating In Oct. 1911 At 5,000 Tpd, Later Expanded To 11,000 Then 15,000 Tpd. In 1924 The Company Merged With The Ray Consolidated Copper Co., Which In Turn Merged With The Nevada Copper Co. In 1926, And With The Kennecott Copper Co. In 1933. Byproduct Molybdenum Concentrate Recovery Began In 1937. A Smelter Was Built At Hurley In 1939 And A Fire Refinery Added In 1942. The Whitewater Leach Plant, Producing Cement Copper, Was Completed In 1963. The Hurley Mill Was Ultimately Expanded To 22,000 Tpd Before Being Replaced By A New 44,000 Tpd Mill At Santa Rita In 1982. The Smelter Was Rebuilt From 1982 To 1984 As A 1570 Tpd Inco Flash Smelter Expanded To 1700 Tpd In 1987. Phelps Dodge Acquired The Mine And Smelter In 1986. A Sx/Ew Plant Was Installed In 1988 Producing 41,000 Tpy Cathode Copper, Expanded In 1993 To 171 Tpd. Mine, Mill, Smelter, And Plant Capacities In 1994 Were 290,000 Tpd Material Mined, Of Which 50,000 Tpd Of 0.68% Cu Material Was Milled Yielding 1,000 Tpd 24% Cu Concentrates Which Are Smelted And 49,000 Tpd 0.18% Cu Tailings Which Are Stockpiled. The Smelter Treats 1,700 Tpd Concentrates And Cement Copper, Yielding 440 Tpd Cu, 2,400 Tpd Sulfuric Acid, 960,000 Lbs/Y Mo, 17,000 Oz/Y Au, And 400,000 Oz/Y Ag. Leach Operations Yield 15 Tpd Cement Copper And 171 Tpd Cathode Copper. Part Of The Smelter Charge Comes From Other Phelps Dodge Mines. In 1800 A Native American Showed Native Copper Ores At Santa Rita To Jose Manuel Carrasco. There Is Some Evidence That Other Spaniards May Have Learned Of The Copper Mineralization Earlier. By 1801 Carrasco And Francisco Manuel De Elguea Had Obtained The Santa Rita Del Cobre Mining Land Grand From The Spanish Crown. Carrasco Sold His Share To Elguea In 1804. After Elguea'S Death In 1809, The Mine Was Worked By A Succession Of Lessees And Subleases, The Elguea Family Or Estate Retaining Ownership. Not All Of The Lessees Have Been Identified. From 1825 To 1827 Juan Ortiz Leased The Mine But Subleased It To Leonardo Siqueros, Sylvester Pattie, And Then Robert Mcknight. Mcknight Acquired The Lease By 1834, But It Passed To Leonardo Siqueros By 1840 Who Retained It Until The Civil War In 1860. Sweete And Lacoste Worked The Mine From 1860 To 1862 When Seized By The Texas Confederacy, But Returned After The Civil War Forming The Santa Rita Mining Association. Their Application To

Rock formation(s): Santa Rita Stock
Chino (Santa Rita) Stock;Montoya Dolomite;Fusselman Dolomite;Lake Valley Limestone;Oswaldo Formation;Syrena Formation


Ore(s): Santa Rita Stock

Other Databases

Wikipedia:	https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chino_mine
Wikidata ID:	Q5351019
Link to USGS MRDS:	10087992

Other Regions, Features and Areas containing this locality

References