Javelin Minerals has completed phase one of a maiden drilling program for 2921m at its Coogee copper-gold project near at Kambalda in Western Australia, discovering key gold indicators along a 950m-long strike trend.
The 18-hole reverse circulation (RC) program recovered 1698 samples sent for assay and identified a copper-gold mineralised trend extending from about 270m south of the southern open pit rim to about 450m north of the northern rim.
The program was designed to identify possible extensions to mineralisation below the current floor – at about 70m depth – at the partly-flooded Coogee open pit.
Additionally, the program sought to explore the possibility of mineralisation extending south of the original Coogee resource, last mined by Ramelius Resources in 2013, which pulled out a reported 147,000 tonnes of ore for 20,400 ounces of gold.
Javelin’s new drilling program represents the first systematic drilling campaign since Ramelius Resources wound up its operations in 2014.
The previous exploration by Ramelius resulted in a shallow, JORC-compliant resource estimated at 126,685 ounces of gold - with about 4133t of copper – which Javelin is confident additional drilling will add to.
Javelin intends to scout out possible north and north-west continuity and extensions of the Coogee pit mineralisation inferred from a pronounced “bullseye” magnetic anomaly – referred to as CG-01 - about 300m north of the old Coogee open pit.
The company believes the extensions could reveal the deeper down-dip potential of Coogee North. Notably, a second new magnetic target CG-02 exists about 400m west of CG-01 and is interpreted as what could be additional mineralisation diving under the Coogee North zone.
The program also served to follow up anomalous gold mineralisation identified by previous air core (AC) and RC drilling at various pattern densities along the trend.
The planned drill depths for the phase one program varied between 70m and 275m.
Javelin Minerals executive chairman Brett Mitchell said: “We are pleased with the rapid completion of the first phase of drilling over our Coogee project. We have identified key gold indicators along the 950m strike from drillhole CORC154 south of the pit to CORC166 about 450m north of the current pit. When we receive the assays, which we expect to start coming in over the coming weeks, we will plan phase two of the program. This means we will have ongoing drilling activity and news flow from both Coogee and Eureka during the first half of 2025”.
The phase two drilling campaign is expected to start in late January/early February when results from the phase one RC program are in hand and will continue to increase the mineralised footprint between the Coogee open pit and Coogee North.
The latter contains an estimated 2.95 million tonnes with more than 96,000 ounces of gold and more than 4000t of copper.
It will also define additional gold extensions below the current pit, where modelling has identified about 360,000t at a grade of 1.29g/t gold for a further 15,000 ounces of gold.
Drilling will also probe the new targets of the north-west trend, exploring the magnetic signatures and the north-west trending shear that parallels the Coogee Shear, which hosts the original high-grade gold mined by Ramelius.
It’s tempting to say Javelin is hunting in a target-rich environment, but it seems appropriate to the company’s name and where it finds itself in this early phase of exploration.
Indications to date show the company is identifying gold-copper potential everywhere it looks along the explored trend and has a solid footing based on structure and magnetics.
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By Doug Bright
