Whelanite

specimen number:
2354029

location:
Bawana Mine, Milford, Beaver Co., Utah, USA

description:
Light blue rich crystallized whelanite across the top of matrix. Good small cabinet sized example for the species. The specimen comes with a label from the collection of Jack Nieburger.

Located in the Rocky Mining District of the Rocky Range near Milford, Beaver County, Utah, the Bawana Mine is an open-pit operation that targeted copper-rich skarn deposits formed by the intrusion of quartz monzonite into surrounding sedimentary limestones. Historically worked for copper and associated base metals, the mine became notable in the field of descriptive mineralogy when its material led to the discovery and formal description of whelanite, a rare hydrated copper calcium silicate carbonate mineral that forms delicate pale blue to greenish-blue platy aggregates in diopside-garnet-magnetite skarns. Named in honor of University of Utah mineralogy professor James A. Whelan, this distinct mineral species makes the location an important type locality for mineral collectors.

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