Takaka Ore Lode Assessed

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30901, 6 November 1965, Page 21

Takaka Ore Lode Assessed

(New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, Nov. 5 A leading Wellington scientist has tentatively assessed the value of the silver-lead-zinc sulphide ore lode discovered in the Takaka area recently by two prospectors on an evening stroll.

Urgently seeking samples of the material for study is Mr T. A. Rafter, Director of the New Zealand Institute of Nuclear Science. Mr Rafter will check the ore for isotope ratio to indicate the origin of the deposits.

He said in an address yesterday that if lode was available to any sufficient bulk, it could be of great value in providing not only zinc and lead but also sulphur. New Zealand each year, exported about 8000 tons of sulphur, chemically combined in wool and other animal products, he said. Fifteen times this amount of sulphur was imported for fertiliser manufacture at a cost of £1 million. Before 1939 some sulphur was mined on White Island and Rotokaua. A survey of the former showed reserves to

be too small to warrant further work. The Rotokaua deposits were found to contain about 10,000 tons of sulphur mixed with pumice, but a process to work this small reserve was not found to be economical. The Institute of Nuclear Research had developed a technique over 12 years far sulphides and had one of the best set-ups now in the world —- equalled only by Canada and Russia.