logo-loader

Argonaut Resources kicks-off gold drilling program at Higginsville

Published: 10:52 30 Jun 2020 AEST

Argonaut Resources NL - Argonaut Resources drilling program commences at Higginsville
Argonaut can earn up to 80% interest in a package of tenements around Higginsville under an earn-in joint venture

Argonaut Resources NL (ASX:ARE) has started drilling of the Island and Birties joint venture gold prospects near Higginsville in Western Australia.

A reverse circulation (RC) program will involve 10-15 holes at the Birties prospect and 15-20 holes at Island.

The total cost of the program is expected to be around $350,000.

Argonaut holds a 51% interest in a package of tenements around Higginsville and can earn up to 80% under an earn-in joint venture.

Island prospect

The Island gold prospect is 9 kilometres south of the Higginsville Mining Camp (+2.5 million ounces) which sits between the St Ives (+15 million ounces) and Norseman (+10 million ounces) gold mining districts in Western Australia.

This prospect is defined by a 1,200 by 400 metres, greater than 10 parts per billion, gold geochemical anomaly from auger drilling samples which sits over a major structural intersection that may have been a conduit for gold mineralising fluids.

The company is confident that the Island prospect benefits from an absence of historic drilling compared to other gold targets as this can limit the potential for future discoveries.

Surface rock-chip samples returned up to 0.34 g/t gold.

Island Gold Prospect – gold deposits and bedrock geology.

AI targeting

SensOre Ltd has applied its artificial intelligence (AI) system to Argonaut’s Higginsville tenements and identified the Island prospect as a target with attractive properties in terms of:

  • Gold endowment probabilities;
  • Gold grade probabilities;
  • Depth to deposit probabilities; and
  • A low exploration maturity ranking.

Birties prospect

The drill target is defined by a broad gold anomaly, which is over 1-kilometre in diameter, is open to the south and features a 500 by 100 metres, more than 20 parts per billion gold peak.

Peripheral, shallow drilling of between 6 metres and 40 metres depth from the 1990s returned anomalous results but appears to have missed the target.

Argonaut plans to drill 10-15 RC drill holes to test the peak gold anomaly, which is structurally emplaced, gabbro-hosted gold mineralisation, in a similar style to the Trident deposit at Higginsville.

Higginsville tenement location, regional geology, major gold occurrences and prospect locations

Earn-in JV

Argonaut and Loded Dog Prospecting Pty Ltd executed the Eastern Goldfields Earn-In Joint Venture and Royalty Agreement on February 7, 2017, giving Argonaut the right to earn an 80% interest in the tenement package according to the following terms:

  • Argonaut earned a 51% interest in the tenement package by completing $500,000 in exploration expenditure within two years of commencement; and
  • Argonaut may earn a further 29% interest, for a total of 80%, for completing an additional $1,500,000 in exploration expenditure within a further three years.

Reimbursement of tenement acquisition expenses totalling $250,000 was paid by Argonaut progressively under the agreement and an issue of ordinary fully paid Argonaut shares valued at $50,000 was issued on execution of the definitive agreement.

The earn-in agreement is in the second earn-in phase.

Australian Strategic Materials signs US$600 million LoI

Rowena Smith, CEO and managing director of Australian Strategic Materials Ltd (ASX:ASM, OTC:ASMMF), joins Jonathan Jackson in the Proactive studio to discuss the company’ s Dubbo Project, in Central West New South Wales. This project aims to extract and process critical minerals and rare earth...

11 hours, 20 minutes ago