Aircore Drilling Identifies High-Grade Gold Mineralisation Under Cover
Carnavale Resources Limited (ASX: CAV) has reported positive results from the second round of aircore drilling at the Kookynie Gold Project in Western Australia.
Chairman, Ron Gajewski, said the drilling programme was designed to follow up on the three gold anomalies identified by the first round of drilling in December 2020. The anomalies at McTavish East and McTavish North have been extended and expanded by this recent drilling program.
“The company continues to explore at a fast pace at the Kookynie Gold Project,” Mr Gajewskisaid.
“The recent round of drilling has extended the anomalous areas first identified in December and has now intersected the high- grade gold mineralisation analogous to the historic gold mines that the Kookynie Mining District is famous for. The anomalies are growing in scale and grade by an order of magnitude from their initial identification.”
The Project is in the central portions of the historic Kookynie mining centre, which has produced over 650,000oz from high-grade gold lodes. Carnavale’s strategy is to explore and define sufficient high-grade gold resources that can be mined and transported to a processing plant nearby.
Two types of gold mineralisation occur in the Kookynie area, high-grade gold associated with pyritic quartz veins hosted within north to northeast dipping structures crosscutting favourable lithologies and high-grade gold associated in fault zones within magnetic, differentiated fractions of the granite plutons.
Bostech Drilling completed a second programme of 117 aircore holes at the Kookynie Gold Project for 5,967m. This programme tested the extents and potential of the multiple gold anomalies and structural features identified the company’s first round of aircore drilling completed in December 2020.
The second phase of drilling at the Kookynie Gold Project is part of a systematic exploration approach employed by the Company targeting high-grade gold mineralisation associated with structural corridors.
The drilling successfully used the strong gold anomalism detected in the first round of drilling as a vector to high-grade mineralisation, similar to that hosted by the historic mines such as Cosmopolitan, Leipold, and McTavish. The second phase of aircore drilling has also significantly expanded the footprint of this gold anomalism in the weathered profile.
McTavish East
Immediately to the east of NME and MCT’s McTavish tenement (McTavish East), Carnavale has discovered gold mineralisation with the anomaly striking over 500m remaining open to the northeast. Significant intercepts include:
- 2m @ 16.25g/t from 54m
- 8m @ 0.90g/t from 70m inc. 4m @ 1.52g/t 7m @ 0.32g/t from 81m
- 2m @ 3.11g/t from 14m
- 2m @ 2.27g/t from 50m
- 4m @ 1.80g/t from 70m inc. 2m @ 3.40g/t 2m @ 1.11g/t from 30m
- 2m @ 1.64g/t from 54m
In the second phase the aircore drilling was extended along strike of the original anomaly to the northeast to expand the extent of the gold mineralisation prior to RC drilling. The second phase of aircore has successfully extended the mineralized zone by over 100m to the northeast and remains open
The gold anomalies to the north of NME and MCT’s McTavish tenement (McTavish North) are characterised by a number of shallow old workings and pits. The recent aircore drilling intercepted high- grade gold mineralisation in weathered rock. Significant intercepts include:
- 6m @ 1.54g/t from 2m inc. 2m @ 3.43g/t and 2m @ 1.01g/t 10m @ 0.74g/t from 12m inc. 6m @ 1.09g/t
- 6m @ 1.08g/t from 8m
- 1m @ 4.54g/t from 31m
The McTavish North Prospect has abundant old workings and pits developed by historic miners that have not been tested by modern exploration techniques until now. Rock chips from around these old workings have returned gold assays that include 33.21g/t and 9.93g/t.
The recent aircore drilling has identified wide zones of gold mineralisation in the regolith profile that provides a vector to potential high-grade mineralisation at depth. The new zone identified by recent drilling strikes 160m to the north and remains open.
