The Eclipse (Warren) occurrence is located east of Warren Creek, approximately 51 kilometres south of Golden.
The area lies along the eastern flank of the Purcell Mountains, west of the Rocky Mountain Trench. The area is underlain by northwest-trending, folded and low-grade metasediments of the upper Proterozoic Horsethief Creek Group. Regionally, these sediments consist of slates, argillites, quartz pebble conglomerates, grits and minor limestone.
The Eclipse occurrences are hosted by folded and north west-trending phyllites, quartz pebble conglomerates, argillites, limy talc schists and quartzites.
Three faults containing chalcopyrite and bornite have been mapped along silicified zones. The faults are associated with shear zones 4 to 5 metres wide, trending from 117 to 135 degrees and dipping 64 to 86 degrees to the south west. The main zone strikes in a northwest direction, sub-parallel to the strike of the metasediments. A second fault forms the contact between pebble conglomerate and shale. Chalcopyrite and bornite occurs in three modes. The first mode is in quartz veins, up to 6 metres wide, and silicified zones. In the second mode, chalcopyrite and bornite occur in quartz boudins within talc phyllite. The boudins are in wall rock on the south side of one fault. Pyrite is more abundant than chalcopyrite in the boudins. In the third mode of occurrence, the mineralization is in hard, limy talc schist, exposed in outcrop. Malachite and azurite are found in shaley cleavage in a location south of the central quartz vein showing, while minor chalcopyrite with possible chalcocite is reported in an arenite with shaley layers located along the flank of a cirque to the southwest.
In 1961, A.C.A. Howe & Associates Ltd. reported average assays of 0.5 per cent copper and 1.7 grams per tonne silver over 6 to 15 metre widths of vein material. At that time, the best intersections from the drill program assayed 1.73 per cent copper, 0.17 gram per tonne gold and 40.11 grams per tonne silver (Assessment Report 4716, page 3).
The first work was in 1920, at which time, two small tunnels, 11 and 6 metres long, and several "hand trenches" were excavated along quartz veins. In 1960 and 1961, St. Andrews Mining Co. conducted airborne and ground electromagnetic surveys and 1201 metres of diamond drilling. They located three chalcopyrite-bearing quartz veins with pods of pyrite and chalcopyrite along the vein walls. In 1968, Carolin Mines Ltd. conducted an exploration program that included an electromagnetic survey, 792 metres of bulldozer trenching and nine diamond drill holes, totalling 666 metres. In 1972, Juniper Mines financed a program of geological, soil (298 samples) and self-potential surveys in the main mineralized zones. Norcen Energy optioned the property in 1979 from Cochrane Oil & Gas Ltd. Norcen completed a large reconnaissance program that included the Warren Creek occurrence. Geochemical and geophysical surveys were included in that project. In 1981, the area was prospected, sampled and mapped by Bluesky Oil & Gas Ltd. as the Warren Creek property.
