Ausgold Ltd (ASX:AUC) has started a diamond drill program targeting high-grade gold mineralisation southeast of the resource at Katanning Gold Project (KGP) in Western Australia’s southwest.
The 1,200-metre program is co-funded by the Exploration Incentive Scheme (EIS) and will provide key geological information to target extensions to high-grade mineralisation at Jinkas South.
Drill targets extend south along strike and down dip from known mineralisation at Jinkas and White Dam.
Resource update planned
These deposits contain resources of 6.8 million tonnes at 1.45 g/t gold for 315,700 ounces and 3.67 million tonnes at 1.30 g/t for 153,700 ounces respectively.
Ausgold hopes that results will help it to plan a larger reverse circulation drill program.
A review and modelling of drilling carried out to date is being undertaken to enable an update of the KGP resource, to include drilling carried out in the 2018 exploration campaign.
Regional exploration
Ongoing regional exploration continues to identify highly promising targets and structures.
Two high-priority target areas have been identified west of the main KGP area along two significant structures 2.5 kilometres west of the main resource area.
Ausgold's Western Australian projects.
New regional potential
An interpretation of high-resolution geophysics has identified new regional potential for gold mineralisation that would add to existing KGP resources.
These western trends represent easterly dipping thrust structures that extend for over 10 kilometres.
The newly identified structures are geologically similar to the main resource areas and previous auger sampling at 1-kilometre spacing identified gold anomalism greater than 10ppb over a strike length of 10 kilometres.
Large landholding
Ausgold’s large holding of more than 4,000 square kilometres is strategically positioned along a significant geological boundary separating the Boddington and Lake Grace terranes.
Faults along this boundary are the same as those that host the gold mineralisation within the KGP. Recent field work by Ausgold has focused on geological mapping and geochemical sampling as part of an ongoing prospectivity study.
Exploration framework
A new geological interpretation of the region based on field mapping has provided a framework to conduct exploration.
This, combined with a significant geochemical database collected by Ausgold and historical data, has enabled Ausgold to identify 42 new regional target areas.
Ongoing work includes surface sampling along with further conceptual targeting to prioritise these newly defined exploration targets.
To facilitate regional exploration, Ausgold has embarked on landholder engagement which will allow access on freehold land across the project area.