12/02/20 – ONE-DAY COURSE WITH DR. JOAN CARLES MEGALREJO: THEORETICAL - PRACTICAL SESSION IN BELLMUNT DEL PRIORAT

Two members of our Chapter (David Ruiz and Ernest Onetti) were invited to attend a one-day course given by Dr. Joan Carles Melgarejo (Mineralogy Professor at the University of Barcelona) and to assist him during the course. This course was organized for a High School class from Amposta, Catalonia, Spain. It consisted of a theorical part (a conference given by Dr. Melgarejo) about geology and ore deposits, and a practical part, were they had the chance to do a half-a-day field trip to the Museum of the Mines of Bellmunt del Priorat (Pb Mines) and to visit other small-scale deposits in the area, such as the Eugènia and Règia mine. The aim of this course was to teach geological concepts to High School students through a divulgative way. 

The main functions of the members from the BCN Student Chapter were to help Dr. Melgarejo, such as in the picking of samples of altered galena, non-altered galena, dolomite, ankerite, siderite, sphalerite, pyrite and marcassite. The samples they picked up are going to be used to complete the collections from the Clonations Pilot Project, a project directed by Dr. Joan Carles Melgarejo. Additionally, they had the opportunity to attend the whole course and get to know better the Geology from Bellmunt del Priorat and get to know how to easily recognize the different minerals observed during the field trip.