Cassiterite

specimen number:
2062947

location:
Iul'tin Mine, Chukotka Autonomous Okrug, Russia

description:
Lustrous black crystal grouping of cassiterite across the top of a massive cassiterite matrix. The crystals are very bright and sharply formed. In very good condition. The specimen comes with a previous label from the collection of Ray DeMark.

Located in the remote Chukotka Autonomous Okrug of Russia, the Iul'tin deposit is hosted within complex regional fault systems and metasedimentary rock sequences intruded by granitic magmatism that drove extensive hydrothermal mineralization. Discovered in the 1930s and heavily developed during the Soviet era through forced and industrial labor, the site became one of the largest combined tin and tungsten mining operations in the world before shutting down and being completely abandoned in the 1990s due to economic unviability. The primary ore mineral cassiterite occurs predominantly inside postmagmatic quartz veins and greisen zones, where it formed alongside associated metallic phases through high-temperature hydrothermal fluid circulation.

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