Kalgoorlie Gold Mining is gearing up for an expanded air core drilling campaign to test for extensions to its recent Lighthorse gold discovery at the company’s Pinjin project in Western Australia’s renowned Laverton gold region.
The Lighthorse find sent the company’s shares on a blistering run over two trading days, which saw its share price surge from 2.3 cents to a peak of 9.9c each. The feat earned KalGold a coveted Bulls N’ Bears Runners of the Week nod in early February.
The upcoming drill program will aim to stretch the impressive discovery’s footprint by nearly 2.5 kilometres, with drilling planned for up to 1.4km to the north and 1km to the south of the mineralised zone.
Management plans to begin the air core program in late April, subject to rig availability. It plans to drill 100 holes for 4500 metres to 5500m depending on the depth of cover and weathering.
The drilling is expected to follow a nominal 160m to 200m-by-80m pattern and final drill collar locations will be determined based on any constraints to local access. The program is expected to take about three weeks.
The drill program will test several prospective target areas including mineralisation and anomalism immediately to the north of the footprint to stretch its northern extension.
Kalgoorlie Gold Mining’s managing director Matt Painter said: “Lighthorse is a compelling gold discovery with a defined 600m footprint, open for several kilometres to the north and south within the Laverton Tectonic Zone. The upcoming air core program will extend effective drill coverage approximately 1400m north along strike and selectively infill historically ineffective drilling over a 1000m strike length to the south.”
KalGold’s nearby Convergence target area is 1km north of Lighthorse and sits where the Lighthorse corridor narrows from 1000m to about 400m east to west and deviates towards a north-westerly strike.
A southern extension will be tested for gold mineralisation and anomalism immediately south of the main discovery area. Historic drilling has been sparse, shallow and mostly ineffective.
KalGold’s initial interpretations of the controls on gold mineralisation at Lighthorse are based on existing data suggesting a brittle, intermediate to mafic, volcanic or subvolcanic unit is the main host to the mineralisation.
According to its working model, warping and deformation in the Laverton Tectonic Zone has caused the unit to crack, providing permeability for gold-mineralising fluids.
Management believes the Convergence area to the north is a significant exploration target as the strike direction changes dramatically.
An ongoing reverse circulation drill program is in progress at Lighthorse, centred around the air core discovery zone, consisting of up to 2500m across 16 drill holes on a 100m-by-80m pattern.
The drilling is designed to penetrate underneath the laterally extensive supergene blanket comprising the discovery and test for primary gold mineralisation in fresh rock at depth below it. The program is expected to take two weeks and gold assays will be fast-tracked. Results are due in mid to late-April.
The distribution of gold observed within the newly discovered zone appears typical of a weathered gold deposit. A horizontal supergene mineralised blanket extends east-west for about 500m at depths below 30m to 40m of transported cover.
The new Lighthorse gold discovery returned several stellar assays including 17m grading 4.81 grams per tonne (g/t) from a depth of 48m and 4m at 4.72g/t from 52m.
Management says the two intervals form a high-grade centre to results announced in December last year, including 8m at 2.29g/t from 60m and 4m going 1.05g/t from 52m. It believes extensive wide-spaced intercepts at the greenfields gold discovery suggest the company may have encountered a large primary gold system.
The discovery zone has a 600m strike running parallel to the Laverton Tectonic zone and remains open to the northwest and southeast. The deposit contains a 200m-wide gold target that remains open down dip with cross-cutting mineralised structures that extend for more than 800m and remain open to the northeast.
KalGold says Lighthorse, 140km northeast of the famous gold mining town of Kalgoorlie, has a larger footprint than either of its nearby Kirgella Gift or Providence deposits.
Recent finds by companies on nearby ground confirm the southeastern section of the Eastern Goldfields as a hot spot for exploration and KalGold holds an extensive footprint in the area.
Several of KalGold’s deposits have defined resources. It recently revealed a 2.34-million-tonne resource grading 1g/t gold for 76,400 ounces, with mineralisation starting from a depth of 3m at the Kirgella Gift-Providence deposits.
The company also has the Bulong Taurus project, about 35km east of Kalgoorlie-Boulder. The project contains the outcropping La Mascotte gold deposit, which has a 2012 JORC-compliant inferred resource of 3.61mt at 1.19g/t gold for 138,000 ounces.
WA’s renowned 30m-ounce Laverton Tectonic zone is one of the State’s most well-endowed gold regions and hosts several producing gold mines, including AngloGold Ashanti’s 10.3m-ounce Sunrise Dam, Gold Fields Limited’s 5.8m-ounce Granny Smith operation and Ramelius Resources’ nearby Rebecca project containing a 1.1m-ounce gold resource.
Today, fellow ASX-listed goldie Latitude 66 Limited announced it was preparing to this month launch a major 9000m air core drilling campaign at its fully owned Edjudina gold project, which is also near KalGold’s high-grade discovery.
KalGold’s existing reverse circulation drill program testing for depth extensions into fresh rock, coupled with the planned April air core program to extend the strike zone, may potentially transform the Lighthorse project into one of WA’s better recent discoveries. With the gold price up nearly 11 per cent this year, the company will gather many more admirers if the drilling programs achieve their objectives.
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By Craig Nolan
