The Geological Survey of Western Australia (GSWA) has commenced an airborne gravity survey spanning an area of approximately 170,000 square kilometres in the state’s Pilbara region.
The launch of the survey follows data from GSWA’s 2018 airborne gravity surveys over the Kimberley Basin, and the Little Sandy and Great Victoria Desert areas.
The survey is the final piece of a seven-year collaborative program between GSWA and Geoscience Australia, a division of the Commonwealth Department of Industry, Innovation and Science.
Airborne surveys of this type and configuration provide data efficiently with no disturbance to people or disruption to activities in the region.
Department of Mines, Industry Regulation and Safety Director Geoscience, Dr Ian Tyler said GSWA began its airborne gravity program in 2016 with a 38,000 line- kilometre survey in the East Kimberley.
“Approximately half the area of Western Australia is now covered with airborne gravity data at an equivalent resolution to GSWA’s ground surveys in the South West of the State,” Dr Tyler said.
“The release of the Pilbara survey data later this year will bring to completion a new generation of regional gravity coverage of the state, with up to 16 times higher resolution than the first-generation coverage of the Australian continent by the then Bureau of Mineral Resources, now Geoscience Australia, in 1975.”