The Phoebe Creek showing is located west of Ecstall River, 73 kilometres southeast of Prince Rupert, B.C. and 63 kilometres southwest of Kitimat.
The area is underlain by part of the north trending Ecstall Pendant, a metavolcanic-metasedimentary belt within the Central Gneiss Complex. The belt is approximately 8 kilometres wide and trends 170 degrees. It is bounded to the west by the Ecstall Pluton and to the east by the Quottoon Pluton, which are part of the extensive Coast Range Intrusive Complex.
The Ecstall Pendant consists mainly of hornblende-plagioclase amphibolites with lesser amounts of quartzite, marble, migmatite and granitoid rocks of late Paleozoic or early Mesozoic age. These rocks have been metamorphosed to the amphibolite facies and are locally migmatitic along pluton margins.
Mineralization in the Phoebe Creek area consists of stringer and disseminated chalcopyrite within quartz-sericite-kyanite schist and mixed gneiss. The stringers are 1 to 3 centimetres wide and a few metres long. A grab sample (AD01939) contained 6.56 per cent copper, 0.0296 per cent zinc, 19.1 grams per tonne silver and 0.15 gram per tonne gold (Assessment Report 16711). The disseminated chalcopyrite occurs in a zone 6.5 metres wide. Seven composite chip samples, taken across 1 metre intervals, indicate that the mineralization is consistent and averages 0.69 per cent copper, 2.22 grams per tonne silver and 0.25 gram per tonne gold (Assessment Report 16711).
The Phoebe Creek prospect was located during prospecting work in the early part of the century (Holyk et al., 1958). This showing lies within the West Grid alteration zone (103H 053) and is exposed along the banks of Phoebe Creek at elevations ranging from 250 metres to 300 metres. Stringer and disseminated chalcopyrite occurrences are hosted in quartz-sericite-kyanite schist. This mineralization is similar in style and grade to the showings in Elaine Creek (103H 053).
The disseminated chalcopyrite zone contains 5 per cent disseminated chalcopyrite across a 6.5-metre-wide band within the quartz-sericite-kyanite schist. A 7-metre composite chip sample across this mineralized band averaged 0.69 per cent copper, 66 parts per million zinc, 2.22 parts per million silver and 251 parts per billion gold (Hassard et al., 1987c, p.20-21 and Figure 7). The disseminated chalcopyrite zone is not well exposed and remains open along strike and to the west.
Stringers of chalcopyrite are scattered throughout the quartz-sericite-kyanite schist and adjacent mixed gneiss unit along Phobe Creek. Individual veinlets range from 1 to 3 centimetres wide and can be traced for a few metres. The best assays from grab samples are 6.56 per cent copper, 2041 parts per million zinc, 19.1 parts per million silver, and 880 parts per billion gold (Hassard et al., 1987c).
Subsequent collection of 26 composite chip samples along Phoebe Creek (Schmidt, 1995) returned best assays of 0.376 per cent copper and 0.347 per cent copper.
The Phoebe Creek showing was included in the 2019 airborne VTEM survey over Kingfisher Resources Ltd.'s Ecstall property. The airborne survey was aimed at detection of structures and/or conductors related to potential Cu-Au-Zn-Ag VMS-style mineralization (Assessment Report 39155).
