Everest Metals Corporation has delivered high-grade gold grades including 97 grams per tonne in a 1m hit from just 8m after rolling out drill and blast works at its Revere gold and base metals project in Western Australia’s Mid West region.
The company says the evidence of near-surface gold mineralisation confirms and continues to support the existence of a large-scale orogenic gold system at the operation. The assays were received as part of a bulk sampling program designed to convert the project’s current exploration target of between 2.5 million tonnes and 4.1 million tonnes grading between 1g/t and 2.5g/t gold into a JORC-compliant resource.
And the market quickly resonated with the news, bumping Everest’s share price up 24 per cent from 12.5c to a high of 15.5c on the company’s highest intraday trading volumes for more than a month as it continues to develop its emerging gold system at Revere.
Further assay highlights also include one hole returning a 2m section at 46.8g/t gold from just 2m with a 1m intercept grading 81.4g/t from just below at 3m. Management says the figures are an example of high-grade gold mineralisation and feature a continuous run of assays exceeding 0.1g/t from 5m down to 11m.
Two additional holes also recorded solid results, with a 1m segment at 38.7g/t gold from 2m, in addition to 1m going 21g/t from 3m.
The company has previously stated that it plans to process the material from the 36,000-tonne bulk sampling campaign by using a “Modular Gekko” gold processing plant, which is being used in some sectors of the industry to get into quick cashflows without huge capex outlays. Importantly, the Gekko system is designed to produce a concentrate that could be directly sold to the Perth Mint.
Everest Metals Corporation executive chairman and chief executive officer Mark Caruso said: “The 7km long Revere Reef system has delivered prolific gold from surface over many years so it’s pleasing to receive assays consistent with the smaller bulk sampling programs previously completed over the tenure. EMC regards this bulk sampling program as the beginning of what will be a systematic and methodical approach to ultimately unlocking what we believe to be a large orogenic gold system – the Revere Reef system.”
The Revere project sits 90km to the north-east of Meekatharra in WA’s Murchison region and is 900km north of Perth. It is just 55km south-west of and along strike from the DeGrussa and Monty copper-gold mines, with its tenement package covering about 171 square kilometres.
Mapping and drilling of the quartz-carbonate gold reef system indicate a complex stockwork of gold lodes that are hosted within an at least a 7km-long system. Gold mineralisation has been intersected from surface down to a depth of 130m.
Historical drilling at Revere returned grades between 0.1g/t gold and 28g/t. However, bigger samples delivered impressive figures including 1195g/t gold from an 80kg bulk sample back in 2007.
Two other bulk samples of 258kg and 293kg were taken in 2018 and landed impressive grades of 18g/t and 357g/t gold.
In a promising sign of progress at the Revere project, Everest has now completed heritage protection agreements with local native title groups across all tenements at the operation, with a mining agreement currently being negotiated.
As the bulk sampling program continues, the company expects ore crushing and processing to kick off this quarter with an upcoming regional air-core (AC) drill campaign set to test further geochemical occurrences in a bid to add vital data to the upcoming mineral resource release.
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By Michael Philipps
