Augustus Minerals appears to have cracked the key geological code to its Music Well gold project near Leonora in Western Australia, intersecting a 71-metre-wide gold zone in a “scissor hole”, designed to confirm the orientation of mineralisation at its Clifton East prospect.
Assays from the first 5 holes of the company's latest reverse-circulation (RC) campaign at the target returned a headline intercept of 71m grading 0.50 grams per tonne (g/t) gold from just 15m downhole. The wide zone also contained a higher-grade core of 13m assaying 1.05g/t gold from 22m.
Notably, the hole was drilled 180 degrees in the opposite direction, a scissor hole, to a previous strong intercept of 34m running 0.83g/t gold to test a new geological theory. The successful move saw the drill bit stay within the mineralised zone for its entire 71m length. The program has now confirmed multiple gold-bearing lodes dip moderately to the northwest, providing a clear guide for follow-up drilling. The company will focus on extending two higher-grade shoots identified through drilling and surface sampling within a 540m by 240m area.
Two other holes drilled 80m to the northeast returned lower grades, suggesting they ran parallel to the mineralised zones rather than across them.
Augustus Minerals general manager exploration Andrew Ford said: "Drilling in the opposite direction to earlier holes was an important test at Clifton East. The latest hole was drilled near the strong intersection in the earlier hole (34m at 0.83g/t Au) and stayed within the gold-bearing zone for 71m. This highlights the down-dip continuity of the mineralisation and shows it dips to the northwest, which gives us a clear direction for the next phase of drilling.”
While the latest results from Clifton East are being digested, Augustus has already moved the drill rig to its next priority target, the St Patrick’s Well prospect. The company appears to have good reason to be keen on St Patrick’s, with previous rock-chip sampling unearthing multiple high-grade gold assays, including stellar results of 30.4g/t, 21.7g/t and 20.4g/t gold along a 600m strike length. The best hit came tantalisingly close to the fabled “one-ounce dirt” of goldfields lore.
Five RC holes are planned at the prospect, which sits on the same major shear zone that plays host to the Clifton East mineralisation and the nearby Celtic gold mine, immediately west of the company's ground, pointing to a potentially fertile structural setting.
The broader Music Well project covers a commanding 1242-square-kilometre land package in the heart of the Leonora-Laverton Greenstone Belt, a district with a reported gold endowment of more than 28 million ounces. The project area sits in a top-shelf neighbourhood, with major mines including Northern Star’s Darlot and Thunderbox operations and Genesis Minerals’ King of the Hills mine all nearby.
The solid result comes with the serious backing of multi-billion-dollar gold producer Gold Fields Limited, which took a strategic 5.33 per cent stake in Augustus earlier this year, adding a layer of heavyweight credibility to the explorer’s activities.
While the company’s main game is its WA gold hunt, it is also chasing an elephant-sized prize in Papua New Guinea, with an application over the 2.5-million-ounce Mt Kare gold-silver project.
In the past, Mt Kare has thrown up some monster drill hits, including 111m at 9.8g/t gold from just 4m and 17.7m at 100g/t gold from 59m, along with a coffee-spitting 20m at 443g/t gold, the sorts of numbers that would easily prise the West Perth mining fraternity out of bed each morning.
While the prize is immense, the path to securing it is complex. The Mt Kare application is contested, with the company currently second in line. Importantly, it's not necessarily first in best dressed, with the government having the final say on who secures the coveted exploration licence. Its assessment considers a raft of criteria, including technical expertise, financial capacity, proposed work programs, landowner support and consent and compliance with environmental and statutory requirements.
Adding weight to its application, Brian Rodan, executive chairman of Augustus, previously worked at Mt Kare. Rodan was managing director of ACM PNG in 2012–13, when the mining contractor secured a contract to undertake the project's stage-one underground exploration drilling and mine development.
With the geological model at Clifton East now significantly refined and a wide mineralised system confirmed, the hunt for higher-grade shoots can begin in earnest. And as the rods now turn at the high-grade St Patrick’s Well prospect just down the road, Augustus looks set to deliver a compelling one-two punch in one of Australia’s premier gold addresses.
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