American West Metals has jagged a 13.5 per cent copper hit in resource upgrade drilling at the Cyclone deposit within its Storm project in Canada – and it has also identified a new target 1.4km to the south.
The company identified the new copper target at the site in Canada’s Nunavut territory while drilling the first hole south of the southern graben fault to test a geophysical anomaly defined some 450m south-west of its Thunder prospect.
The high-grade Cyclone copper hit is just one of multiple intercepts in a single reverse-circulation (RC) drillhole collared within the 0.35 per cent copper cut-off resource boundary in the north-east of the deposit.
Management says the full suite of intercepts in the hole highlight the upgrade potential and a possible 100m north-eastwards extension of its Cyclone deposit. They include 1.5m at 13.5 per cent copper and 23 grams per tonne silver from 54.9m, 3.1m going 2 per cent copper and 8g/t silver from 85.3m and 1.5m running 1.8 per cent copper and 3g/t silver from 109.7m.
In addition to the main hits, the lower three intercepts exhibit strong (up to 3.7 per cent copper) vein and fracture-style chalcocite (copper sulphide) mineralisation with minor chalcopyrite and are bounded by broad haloes of lower-grade copper. Four zones of strong copper sulphide mineralisation hosted within fractured dolomite of the regionally-prospective Allen Bay Formation were intercepted in the hole.
The upgrade potential for Cyclone is further reinforced in results from a second drillhole collared 250m west of the first. It lies in thinly-tested ground about 125m north of the northern boundary of the Cyclone resource.
The intercept comprises 27.4m at 1.1 per cent copper and 3.5g/t silver from 96m including 4.6m going 3.1 per cent copper and 7.7g/t silver from 109.7m.
A third hole designed to infill the centre-east of the existing resource produced a first intercept of 3.1m at 3.9 per cent copper and 10.5g/t silver from 57.9m including 1.5m at 5.9 per cent copper and 16g/t silver from 57.9m. A second deeper intercept in the same hole delivered 4.6m going 1.4 per cent copper and 5g/t silver from 71.6m including 1.5m going 3.1 per cent copper and 11g/t silver from 71.6m.
American West Metals managing director Dave O’Neill said: The program has now exceeded the planned 20,000m of drilling, and we have made another significant copper discovery in the Storm area, now named ‘Squall’. It is the second new discovery of near-surface copper mineralisation in the Southern Graben Area this year and highlights the outstanding growth potential and still relatively untested nature of Storm.”
The company’s 2024 drilling to date at its Storm and Tempest projects now totals 128 RC drillholes and 14 diamond drillholes, exceeding its originally-planned 20,000m. Around-the-clock drilling is continuing, with additional assays expected to come back in batches in the next few weeks.
American West’s maiden JORC-compliant mineral resource estimate for Cyclone defines a combined indicated and inferred 12.1 million tonnes at 1.2 per cent copper and 3.4g/t silver, with the deposit remaining open in all directions.
In other work, the company’s geophysical exploration is employing deep moving-loop electromagnetic (MLEM) surveying at its Tornado and Blizzard locations and has identified two high-priority electromagnetic (EM) anomalies in favourable stratigraphy coinciding with outcropping copper. The association between EM geophysical anomalism and copper sulphides in the Storm area has now been well-established.
The most recent example of the exploration application is highlighted by management’s discovery of its newly-named Squall target where recent drilling of a MLEM anomaly in an untested area south of the Thunder Prospect – and most significantly, on the south side of the interpreted southern graben boundary fault – has intersected strong visible copper sulphides from about 181.4m downhole.
Assays results for the hole are awaited.
American West is pressing ahead with its resource extension RC drilling at Cyclone and on other high-priority geophysical targets, while the fly RC drill rig has moved to the Tornado and Blizzard copper prospects. Diamond drilling is also in progress on deep exploration targets in the Storm area, while deep-search EM surveys are underway at Tornado and Blizzard.
American West seems to be on a roll, with geophysics turning up targets almost as fast as the rigs can get scout drillholes into them – aided by the fact that EM anomalies are commonly associated with sulphide mineralisation within the tested depth range between the surface and 400m.
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By Doug Bright
