Pyrite

specimen number:
2102436

location:
Bingham Canyon Mine, Salt Lake Co., Utah, USA

description:
Bright lustrous cubic golden crystals of pyrite measuring to 2.5 cm in size on a massive pyrite matrix. In good condition, nice for this classic Utah locality and species.

The Bingham Canyon mine, located in the Oquirrh Mountains near Salt Lake City, Utah, is a world-class copper porphyry deposit and one of the largest open-pit mining operations in history. Geologically, the deposit formed during the Eocene epoch when a series of quartz monzonite porphyry stocks intruded into Upper Paleozoic quartzites and limestones, generating a massive hydrothermal system that deposited disseminated copper, molybdenum, gold, and silver ores alongside peripheral skarn mineralization. Underground extraction of high-grade silver and lead veins began around 1863 following discoveries by the Bingham brothers, but the district transitioned to pioneering large-scale open-pit mining in 1906 under the direction of Daniel Jackling and the Utah Copper Company, which later became part of Kennecott Copper Corporation. Today managed by Rio Tinto, the pit has grown to over three-quarters of a mile deep and two and a half miles wide, operating continuously as a premier industrial producer for over one hundred and twenty years with current production authorized to extend well into the twenty-first century.

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