Estrella Resources has declared a maiden inferred mineral resource estimate of 0.86 million tonnes at 0.66 per cent nickel and 0.42 per cent copper at its T5 deposit in the Goldfields region of WA.
The company says the latest estimate underpins an updated JORC exploration target of five to seven million tonnes at 0.7 to 1.5 per cent nickel and 0.3 to 0.5 per cent copper for the basal contact at its wholly owned Carr Boyd nickel project 80km north-east of Kalgoorlie.
In addition to the inferred nickel and copper resource at T5, the company says the estimate also includes more than 12,000 ounces of platinum and palladium with about 55,000 ounces of silver associated with sulphide mineralisation at the site.
The T5 mineral resource estimate has been calculated using 43 diamond drill holes and three RC holes covering a strike length of 500m from near surface to a depth of 720m.
A total of 34 regional diamond drill holes and 56 RC holes have been combined with the T5 estimate to support the updated exploration target for the basal contact at Carr Boyd of between 35,000 to 105,000 nickel tonnes and 15,000 up to 35,000 copper tonnes.
Additional work on the remaining Carr Boyd exploration target outside the basal contact is ongoing and currently not JORC compliant.
Estrella Resources Managing Director, Chris Daws said: “I am pleased to report this initial MRE for T5 which is a significant milestone for Estrella and is a major step towards quantifying a sizeable exploration target estimate for the Carr Boyd basal contact.”
Carr Boyd hosts 16km of basal contact strike and includes the Broonhill, Sir William Wallace and Gossan Hill prospects in addition to potential extensions of the T5 deposit.
Estrella recently received results from drilling at Broonhill with assays averaging a true width of 6.23m going 0.6 per cent nickel and 0.7 per cent copper including 1.2m at 1.2 per cent copper in addition to another 0.6m at 1.81 per cent copper.
Initial drilling at Gossan Hill returned results including a 3m intercept at 0.6 per cent nickel, 0.3 per cent copper and 0.8 grams per tonne platinum group elements from 114m.
The untested basal contact at the Sir William Wallace and Tregurtha prospects will be targeted either late this year or early next year as the company identifies further opportunities at Carr Boyd.
In the meantime it will focus its drilling on the company’s Gossan Hill and Broonhill prospects.
The Carr Boyd nickel mine was discovered in the late 1960s by Great Boulder Mines and operated by Western Mining Corporation between 1973 and 1977.
After repeatedly changing hands for the next 40 years the site was acquired by Estrella in 2017.
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By Matt Birney
