 Overview
Three Kutztown
University
undergraduate students - Melania Tkach, Dan Ruth, and Ken Schlosser -
traveled with me to Alaska to do research on Alaskan mineral
deposits.
Our expedition had three stages:
- tourism in Kenai Fjords National
Park,
- safety training in Anchorage, and
- geologic mapping and
drill core logging in the eastern interior at Mount Fairplay.
In addition to the websites I've put together for this project, each of
the three students have also created websites to describe their
experiences. If you'd like to see/read the student perspectives
on
the
project, please visit their sites:
|
Kenai
Fjords
National
Park
 The
first
week
of
our
trip
was
spent
hiking
and
boating
in
Kenai Fjords National Park. Of
course, our research had nothing to do with the Park, but we would have
been negligent not to take advantage of visiting the Park since we were
in the area. The Park is a remarkable place to see both geology
and wildlife.
Click
here to see photos of our experiences in Kenai Fjords National Park.
|
Training
 Prior to our field
work, we took a four day long wilderness safety course at Learn to Return
Training Systems.
We
learned
and
practiced
evacuation from downed aircraft (planes and
helicopters), bear awareness, and wilderness medicine.
Click
here to see photos of our safety training experiences in Anchorage.
|
Mount
Fairplay
 The meat of our project was an exploration of
Mount Fairplay. Mount Fairplay is one of the highest peaks in the
area in the subdued
topography of the Yukon-Tanana
Terrane.
It
is
a
place
where there has been volcanic activity that may have
associated mineralization. Our project was to make a geologic map
of the mountain and document any signs of mineralization present.
Click
here to see photos of our Mount Fairplay project field work.
Click
here for a basic description of the geology of porphyry molybdenum
deposits.
|
Logging
drill
core
 We also were granted access to
study some drill core owned by Full Metal Minerals.
The
question
we
wished
to
address here was whether or not the drill hole
intercepted mineralized rocks. We did so by devising a
quantitative method of analyzing the drill core.
Click
here for photos of our core logging experience.
|
Camp
life
 We stayed at a camp near Chicken - an old placer
mining town settled by gold miners in the late 1800's. The total
population is only about 10-20 year-round residents now, but they're a
lively group. In their spare time, students panned for a little
gold in the nearby creek.
Click
here for photos of camp life.
|
Potential porphyry/epithermal
mineralization on Mount Fairplay, Interior Alaska
