Application of AEM for cover thickness mapping in the southern Thomson Orogen

Abstract

Regional airborne electromagnetic (AEM) surveying in the southern Thomson Orogen of southwest Queensland and northwest New South Wales highlights the efficacy of AEM for mapping near-surface Paleozoic basement rocks, the basement-cover interface, and the hydrostratigraphy of cover rocks of the Eromanga and Lake Eyre basins. Interpretations of AEM data are applied to model the basement-cover interface and answer the important question “how thick is cover” in this underexplored region, and encourage the mineral exploration industry to explore more widely. This paper shows some of the interpretation highlights from regional AEM surveys conducted in 2014 and 2016. The interpretations, when considered with regional borehole basement intersections, reduce exploration risk by demonstrating that large portions of the basement are within reach of exploration drilling.