Structure and iron mineralisation of the Carajás Province

Abstract

The Carajás Province presents several volcano-sedimentary sequences that comprise the Itacaiúnas Supergroup. The rocks represent bimodal volcanism, and clastic and chemical sedimentation in relatively unstable basins subject to recurrent structural events with subsidence and volcanism. The Grão Pará Group represents one of these sequences with mafic volcanic rocks that enclose discontinuous jaspilite lenses, with development of large high-grade orebodies (Fe>65%). This unit is named the Carajás Formation and presents peculiar characteristics compared with other iron districts in the world, thereby departing from the classic Lake Superior or Algoma iron formation types. Owing to the dense vegetation, lack of outcrops and harsh landscape, the structural analysis of the district can only be accomplished by combination of regional field work, detailed structural work on the open pits and remotely sensed image interpretation, in this case Landsat ETM7, JERS-1 images and the shuttle radar topography mission (SRTM) digital terrane model. The regional trend of the several sequences of the area is approximately N–S and the structure is dominated by a flattened flexural fold system with axes moderately dipping WNW, intersected by several strike-slip faults subparallel to their axial plane. The Serra dos Carajás represents an s-shaped synform-antiform pair, herein named the Carajás Fold. This regional structure is partially disrupted by the Carajás Shear Zone that divides it in the northern (Serra Norte) and the southern (Serra Sul) Ranges and also probably prepared the terrane with the development of pathways for mineralising hydrothermal fluids forming large high-grade massive iron bodies. Syntectonic granitic bodies played an important role in the structural evolution of the area as well. They caused localised ductile flattening deformation and thermal contact metamorphism in surrounding terranes. The Estrela pluton, for instance, was responsible for the discontinuity of the regional trend between the Serras do Rabo and Leste. The Carajás Province is regionally the upper crustal product of a very shallowly eroded dome-and-keel geometry of Neo-Archaean volcano- sedimentary units intruded by syntectonic calc-alkaline intrusives and overlying pre-existing infracrustal rocks. The lithostructural data suggest continental-margin back-arc basin development and closure in an oblique collision belt, with N–S shallow crustal shortening, parallel to the inferred pre-existing strike of the stratigraphy.