Cannington Mine: Australia’s Richest Silver-Lead-Zinc Deposit Explained

Located in northwest Queensland, the Cannington Silver-Lead-Zinc Mine is one of the most mineralogically significant and economically valuable deposits in Australia. This blog explores the geological evolution of the deposit, which formed during the Proterozoic in a volcanogenic-sedimentary setting. The Cannington deposit is hosted within high-grade metamorphic rocks and is believed to have originated from hydrothermal fluids that introduced massive sulphide mineralization—particularly galena (PbS), sphalerite (ZnS), and native silver—into structural traps and lithological contacts. Over millions of years, intense pressure and metamorphism concentrated these minerals into one of the world's richest known silver-lead-zinc systems. We break down the mineralogy, host rock context, and the tectonic processes that made this deposit globally significant.