Gold and lithium explorer Ora Banda Mining has identified five new gold targets from a detailed mapping and rock chip sampling program in the Greater Callion area of the North-Eastern Goldfields of Western Australia. The targets will be tested with a reverse-circulation drill rig as early as possible in the coming financial year.
A mapping and sampling program is continuing to further delineate the geological and structural settings of the gold occurrences and will assist in future drill program design.
The company has been actively exploring the Greater Callion area since last year, with a view to finding another high-grade Callion-style deposit.
Ora Banda says an air core rig has commenced a first-pass drilling program north-west of the main Callion deposit. Further targets in the area are pencilled in for drill testing, along with a prospective area north of the historic Lady Gladys deposit, that has a cumulative production of about 2Mt at 2.47 g/t gold, making it one of the larger producers in the district.
The area is part of the Mulline Trend covering an area of about 20 square kilometres and is associated with the highest surface gold anomalism in the entire Ora Banda landholding and includes several near-surface-mined laterite gold deposits. Primary gold mineralisation in the area is associated with quartz and sulphide veins in shear zones within basalt and dolerite units. Mineralisation is also associated with porphyry units that have intruded the mafic sequence.
Ora Banda says the new drill program will test for the near-surface expression of any potential gold mineralisation in the targeted areas. The company recently completed a large rock chip and mapping program. Rock chip sampling focused on known old workings to help define controls on the gold mineralisation and possible multi-element signatures.
Due to a large backlog at the assay lab, the results have only recently been received by Ora Banda, however they proved to be well worth the wait. Several high-grade, small to medium-size targets have been delineated, with many of these never previously drill tested or only ineffectively in the past.
Based on the work completed to date and historical reports, Ora Banda has complied the following priority drill targets from rock chip assays: Lady Kate with results of 6.7 g/t and 6.32 g/t gold, Callion Queen returning 7.72g/t, 4.53g/t and 2.60g/t gold, Welcome Stranger with assays of a stunning 18.6g/t and 26.9g/t gold, Lady Dorothy providing 18.9g/t, 5.63g/t and 4.75g/t gold and King Edward with rock chip assays of 5.52g/t and 3.05g/t gold.
A “first pass” air core drilling program has commenced over the main Callion deposit to test for near-surface high-grade gold mineralisation. Preliminary logging at Callion has noted significant quartz veining and some intense alteration at and close to a geologically significant contact. The program was extended over the Lady Kate prospect with a small number of holes designed to test the potential for a high-grade vein recently exposed by near surface prospecting. Assay results are anxiously anticipated.
The existing Callion open pit is about 650m long and approximately 40m deep with the underground workings extending off the southern end of the pit to a vertical depth of 220m below surface. The deposit has been exploited underground by various operators since the early 1900s, with more substantial development undertaken by Western Mining Corporation during the period before and after WWII. In the 1980s additional underground and open-pit mining was undertaken by the Callion JV before a second round of open-pit development by Croesus in 2004-2005.
The historical Callion mine had a gold endowment of about 200,000 ounces at an average grade of an admirable 6.4 grams per tonne gold. Total historical gold production was 280Kt running a stellar 10.2 g/t gold for 91,650oz.
An upgraded Callion Mineral Resource Estimate of 680,000 t at 4.9 g/t gold for 107,000 oz gold was released by the company in 2020.
Callion is just 14km south-west of the company’s Davyhurst processing plant that comprises a 1.2 million tonnes per annum gold processing circuit, fully permitted mining licences, accommodation facilities and a full complement of supporting infrastructure. Currently it is processing ore from the Riverina open-cut mine about 30km to the north and underground ore from Golden Eagle 3.2km from the plant.
Ora Banda Mining’s Interim CEO, Andrew Czerw says: “Callion is a well-known mine in the Eastern Goldfields due to the relatively high-grade tenor of the ore lodes. Discovering a similar style deposit in this area is a really attractive target for us. The fact that it is located so close to our Davyhurst process plant and because the surrounding area has received such limited exploration due to its disjointed ownership history, it was a no-brainer for us to zero in on the prospects surrounding the Callion mine. The Greater Callion area will remain a high-priority focus for life extension past the current reset plan.”
Ora Banda’s tenement package is made up of 95 mostly contiguous tenements 50km south-west of Menzies, covering an area of about 1,210 square kilometres. Gold is not the only commodity within the company’s tenure, with known lepidolite dominant lithium pegmatite occurrences scattered across its Riverina, Davyhurst, Callion and Lady Ida project areas.
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