A showy example of lavender cherty sussexite from Sterling Hill’s North Orebody, bordered by calcite, in altered willemite-franklinite-calcite ore. Under shortwave ultraviolet radiation (SW UV) most of the brownish-red willemite in the ore fluoresces green, but within about 3 cm of the sussexite-calcite mass the willemite is altered and nonfluorescent, though there is little or no visible difference in daylight between the altered and unaltered willemite. As mentioned in specimen SSX29, the steeply inclined fractures in the sussexite are joints. This specimen is from the SPEX/Gerstmann collection and is on display at the Franklin Mineral Museum, where it is cataloged as FMM-1439.
Identifier: SSX19a Locality: South limb of the North orebody, Sterling mine, Ogdensburg Specimen size: 11 x 10 x 2.5 cm Photo credit: Earl R. Verbeek