Reach Resources has intercepted thick rare earths hits at its 100 per cent owned Wabli Creek project in WA’s Gascoyne region, scoring a whopping 109m running 1109 parts per million total rare earth oxides (TREO).
Initial assays from 18 holes drilled at the company’s Pelops target, part of a wider 40-hole reverse-circulation (RC) program, returned significant intersections of rare earths assaying more than 1000 ppm, with many from surface and multiple holes ending in mineralisation.
An impressive intercept of 109m going 1109ppm TREO from 11m includes 8m of the more lucrative “magnet” rare earth oxides grading 270ppm. Another 80m hit came in at 1280ppm TREO from surface and included a 16m slice of magnetic rare earth oxides returning 257ppm.
Management says the drill campaign was guided by a mix of previous rock chip and soil sampling programs, geological mapping and geophysical surveys.
The 40-hole program targeted the Pelops, Broteas and Amphion prospects, with the remaining assays for Broteas and Amphion due in the coming weeks. Pelops was prioritised due to strong potential for rare earth oxides and the valuable niobium metal.
The company says the mineralisation is hosted exclusively in an “Alkaline granite intrusion”, which has provided a high level of consistent mineralisation across the tested ground. Notably, it says there is potential for the entire alkaline granite intrusion to be mineralised, which would create a significant target for the company to pursue.
Multiple intersections of high-grade magnet rare earth oxides were discovered with all four of the in-demand magnetic oxides present. They include neodymium, praseodymium, terbium and dysprosium. and Reach believes the consistency of the mineralisation may result in further high-grade magnet rare earths zones being discovered.
Niobium was also observed in local concentrations and the rare earth-bearing mineral monazite was found to be distributed throughout the granite intrusive, with higher levels unearthed in mineralised zones.
Reach Resources CEO Jeremy Bower said: “This is a solid result from our maiden drill campaign at Wabli Creek. These initial results show large zones of TREO mineralisation and almost exclusively within the Alkaline Granite which means the target is potentially very large, considering the size of the intrusion and the mineralisation remains open at depth. We look forward to receiving the remainder of the assays so we can understand the extent of what we have discovered.”
Management says petrology confirms the prominent minerals at the site to be monazite and zircon and it plans to conduct further geochemical analysis to plan the next phase of work programs at the site.
Interestingly, it remains to be seen how weathered the granite material containing the rare earth oxides at Wabli Creek is.
The extent to how weathered the material is can play a large role in determining the prospectivity of the deposit and can be a determining factor in the type of mining and processing required to develop the project.
As an example, Red Metal’s world-class Sybella rare earths project has been described by its management as “globally-unique” due to it being considered as neither hard-rock or a clay-type deposit.
Sybella’s material is a rare earth oxide-enriched granite considered to be extremely soft and weathered. In fact, Red Metal says the first 10m, and in some cases 20 metres from surface, is “free-digging” requiring no drilling and blasting and can be simply excavated straight out of the ground, providing tremendous savings due to the removal of drilling and blasting costs.
Metallurgical work from Australia’s leading nuclear science and technology firm ANSTO, showed the Sybella ore to be amenable to a cheap heap-leach process, improving its processing options and economic prospects considerably.
For Reach to classify its material as unique and neither a standard hard-rock or clay project, further work will be needed, which will go a long way towards providing answers to the all-important questions of what mining and processing methods will be needed to make Wabli Creek a winner.
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By Craig Nolan
