Step-Out And Extensional Drilling Success In Brazil
Centaurus Metals (ASX:CTM) has reported further outstanding high-grade nickel sulphide results from ongoing resource in-fill, extensional and step-out drilling at the Jaguar Central Deposit, part of its 100%-owned Jaguar Nickel Sulphide Project in the Carajás Mineral Province of northern Brazil.
In-fill diamond drilling continues to intersect significant thick semi-massive to massive nickel sulphides at the Jaguar Central Deposit, with new assays including: 3.3m at 1.72% Ni, 0.12% Cu and 0.04% Co from 57.0m; 47.1m at 1.37% Ni, 0.08% Cu and 0.03% Co from 65.9m, including 13.1m at 2.34% Ni ,0.15% Cu and 0.05% Co from 65.9m; and 53.0m at 0.94% Ni, 0.03% Cu and 0.03% Co from 25.0m in hole JAG-DD-20-080, including: 12.7m at 1.99% Ni, 0.02% Cu and 0.08% Co from 50.0m
Since its June 2020 JORC Mineral Resource Estimate (MRE) release, the Jaguar Central Deposit has consistently delivered thick semi-massive to massive nickel sulphides intersections and remains open at depth and along strike to the east.
Managing Director, Darren Gordon, said recent drilling continued to validate the potential of the Jaguar Central Deposit to provide low strip ratio, high-grade ore in the early part of the proposed mine plan for the Jaguar Project.
“We have intersected significant wide zones of high-grade mineralisation in a flat-lying shoot extending over approximately 500 metres of strike at the Jaguar Central Deposit, and the favourable geometry of the mineralisation is expected to be advantageous in providing early project payback under any development scenario.
“Much of the recent successful drilling at Jaguar Central sits outside the existing Mineral Resource and we remain confident that we should be able to lift the overall Jaguar Central contribution to the Mineral Resource Estimate as part of the Resource upgrade due in early 2021.
“We believe that the intersections generated from drilling at Jaguar Central over the last couple of months represent some of the best near surface nickel sulphide intersections seen in the market for some time and the results continue to support our view that the Jaguar Project is well on its way to being one of the few nickel sulphide projects to be developed over the next 2-3 years.
“The Scoping Study work is progressing well and we remain on track to deliver the Scoping Study results to the market in Q1 2021, after we have delivered our planned Mineral Resource upgrade.
“Four diamond rigs and one RC rig are on site drilling double-shift with a significant portion of the current drilling targeted at upgrading Inferred Resources into the Indicated category while also allowing the Company to drill some significant step-out holes into a number of the deeper prospective targets at the known mineral deposit areas.”
The Company’s maiden JORC MRE for the Jaguar Nickel Sulphide Project was released in June 2020 and measured 48.0Mt at 1.08% Ni for 517,500 tonnes of contained nickel, and included 7.4Mt at 1.13% Ni for more than 80kt of contained nickel for the Jaguar Central deposit. The high grade MRE of 20.6Mt at 1.56% Ni for 321,400 tonnes of contained nickel included a near-surface component at the Jaguar Central Deposit of 4.1Mt at 1.44% Ni for ~60kt of contained nickel.
