ASX-listed Latitude Consolidated has taken its Murchison gold project resource past one million ounces after more than doubling its Turnberry open pit gold inventory to 610,000 ounces ahead of receiving first assays from a new 10,000-metre drilling program. The updated 1.115-million-ounce project resource includes 505,000 ounces grading an impressive 8.6 g/t in the high-grade Andy Well mine that Latitude bought from Silver Lake Resources earlier this year.
Turnberry, where the mineralisation defined over 1.5km remains open at depth and along strike, was not mined during the period when former operator Doray Minerals extracted 330,000 ounces at an average 8 g/t from Andy Well between 2013 and 2017.
Latitude sees potential to extend the existing resource at Turnberry and also possibly grow it along a highly prospective corridor between the Turnberry resource and the St Anne’s prospect so the south.
The “underexplored Turnberry-St Anne’s corridor” is a focus for Latitude’s large drilling program, which is set to produce assays from early next month. Results from the 5.5km-long Turnberry-St Anne’s corridor are expected to flow through in July.
Previous aircore drilling in the corridor produced “significant” results through 10-20m of transported cover and regolith that demand the deeper RC drilling follow-up in progress, according to Latitude.
The company inherited extensive drilling and geological records in its A$8 million acquisition of the Murchison project from Silver Lake. Latitude’s new Turnberry JORC resource estimate uses a 0.5 g/t gold cut-off grade and A$2,400/oz gold price. This is a significantly higher gold price than at the time Andy Well was mothballed and Turnberry, or Gnaweeda as it was previously called, was assessed using a 1.5 g/t cut-off grade.
Whereas the previous resource estimate considered 16 discrete gold lodes, the new model captures “all mineralisation present in drill holes”, covering some 43 discrete lodes that underpin the latest resource.
Latitude’s exploration team sees the best zones of gold mineralisation at Turnberry occurring in the central part of the resource within a highly magnetic, low chromium fractionated dolerite unit. Magnetic anomalies along strike from Turnberry, including the most pronounced at St Anne’s, are “interpreted to be similar in character to the Turnberry magnetic feature” according to the company.
Limited drilling at St Anne’s has already thrown up gold intercepts such as 20m grading 2.4 g/t from 57m including 8m at 5 g/t and 15m at 1.5 g/t from 104m including 4m grading 4.7 g/t.
Latitude Consolidated CEO, Tim Davidson said: “We continue to build on our large, existing high-grade gold resource and this 125% upgrade at Turnberry is a fantastic outcome for Latitude. In short order, we have been able to clearly demonstrate the true scale and growth potential of our high-grade gold projects in the prolific Western Australian gold producing region of the Murchison.
“Turnberry is a shallow, high-grade deposit that has significant strike of 1.5km and remains open at depth and along strike. Given the scale of mineralisation at Turnberry the company is increasingly excited by the St Anne’s prospect, which lies 3.5km to the south of Turnberry and displays similar grade and width characteristics to that seen at Turnberry in the limited drilling completed at the prospect to date.”
Mining was stopped at Andy Well in September 2017 on thin margins when the owner’s heavy debt and competing capital requirements coincided with a period of lower gold prices.
Latitude is working in a different pricing environment now and has a clean balance sheet and circa $3.9 million of cash to pursue systematic exploration and development.
The company says three high-grade lodes defined at Andy Well have not previously been mined and the remaining 505,000-ounce resource – at 73 per cent measured and indicated – remains open at depth and along strike.
Latitude’s 343 square kilometres of mining and exploration licences, now with more than 1.1 million ounces of resources, give the company an exciting growth platform in a region populated with large-scale, hungry gold mills and producers looking to grow their exposure to high-grade, scalable open pit and underground resources.
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By Matt Birney
