BLACK SAND MINERALS

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27048, 25 May 1953, Page 10

BLACK SAND MINERALS

RUTILE OBTAINED IN AUSTRALIA

"STUDY COULD HELP NEW ZEALAND ” (New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, May 24. The treatment of black sands for mineral deposits being done in Australia was of considerable interest to New Zealand in view of its own iron sands, said the Director of the Geological Survey (Dr. L. I. Grange) on his return to Wellington yesterday after attending the fifth Empire Mining and Metallurgical Congress in Melbourne. The Australians* were obtaining rutile, a titanium mineral, from their black sands and selling it to the United States for dollars, said Dr. Grange. Many of Australia’s mineral deposits were of interest to New Zealand because they occurred in rocks and rock formations also common in the Dominion. A study of what was being done in the Commonwealth could help New Zealand to determine the best methods of prospecting in similar country. Dr. Grange said the delegates to the conference were taken to Broken Hill, Mount Isa, Mount' Morgan and other areas where they could see all the country’s main coalfields and lead, zinc and copper mines. Coalmining was on a much bigger scale than in New Zealand and was more highly mechanised. Near Melbourne low-grade coals similar to those found near Mataura were being worked on a large scale. There was full employment in the coalmining industry.

Australia had an outstanding transport system, said Dr. Grange, and was thus able to keep busy the Commonwealth’s thriving iron and steel industry, Iron ore from Yampi Sound, in Western Australia, was carried 2500 miles to Newcastle, for example, but in spite of this handicap, iron and steel could still be produced on an economic basis. In another case, coal was carried more than 400 miles to Mount Isa.