The Lisheen Zn-Pb-Ag deposit, located in County Tipperary in southeast-central Ireland, consists of a group of strata-bound pyritic sulfide lenses containing 22 Mt of ore with an overall grade of 11.5 percent Zn, 1.9 percent Pb, 26 g/t Ag, and 16 percent Fe hosted in Lower Carboniferous (Early Mississippian) carbonate rocks. Sulfide bodies at Lisheen are restricted to the Waulsortian mudbank complex and the Lisduff oolite unit of the Ballysteen limestone, which compose the stratigraphically lowest, nonargillaceous carbonate horizons in the local Lower Carboniferous succession. The deposit is located within a major right-stepping relay zone of a segmented normal fault system. Sulfide bodies occur adjacent to the normal faults; thickest development of sulfides generally occurs at points of maximum throw Metal zoning is well developed relative to these structures. The Waulsortian mudbank complex and portions of the overlying succession were subjected to air early, pre-mineralization, regional-scale dolomitizing event that increased permeability. The regional dolostone produced by this event is cut and replaced by hydrothermal dolomite, referred to as black matrix breccia and white matrix breccia, associated with mineralization. Hydrothermal dolomitization was most intense in the Waulsortian mudbank complex, though it locally affected rocks from the Silurian basement to more than 200 in above the level of major sulfide precipitation. The majority of the Lisheen deposit consists o ........

The underground mine is accessed via a 1.5 km long tunnel, which slopes gradually downwards, from the surface to a depth of 200 metres below surface. The tunnel is over 6 metres wide and 5 metres high. The underground facilities include water pump stations, mobile equipment workshops and warehouses as well as the main crusher station. The ore is extracted using three mining methods; room and pillar, drift and fill and open stoping.

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