Salt geology and mining traditions: Kalush and Stebnyk mines (Fore-Carpathian region, Ukraine)

Abstract

Development of industrial underground salt mining in western Ukraine has started in the mid-19th century with the discovery of large potash-magnesium salt deposits in Kalush (1854) and Stebnyk (1901). Potash salts concentrations occur within the Miocene sedimentary complexes of Ukrainian Carpathian Foredeep (correlated with the successions observed in the Polish part of Carpathian Foredeep) as isolated lenses or compressed folded layers of varied extent. Thickness of exploited potash seams varies from 4 m up to 150 m and the main mineral is sylvine, accompanied also by carnallite, kainite and langbeinite. Both Kalush and Stebnyk mines, now closed, belong to the first places in the world, where exploitation of potash salts were realized. Their unique historical character, documenting the salt exploitation traditions in this region and evolution of mining techniques, ought to be widely advertised as the valid points of Ukrainian-Polish cross-border geotouristic route, named “Traces of large extinct mammals, earth wax, oil and salt”.