Drilling to test Havieron look-alike targets at Budjidowns tenement
Greatland Gold plc (AIM: GGP) announce the commencement of its maiden drilling campaign at the Paterson South Project which is under a farm-in and joint venture arrangement with Rio Tinto Exploration (see RNS Announcement titled “Farm-in to Rio Tinto’s highly prospective Paterson South tenure” dated 30 May 2023). Exploration drilling has begun at the Stingray target on the Budjidowns tenement which is located north of Greatland’s world class Havieron gold-copper project.
Highlights
- Drilling has commenced at the Stingray target which is an underexplored magnetic anomaly within the Budjidowns tenement
- Drilling will commence shortly at the Decka target which is a combined magnetic and conductive anomaly within Proterozoic sediments, similar to Havieron
- Both targets are modelled within 250m of surface, making them shallower than Havieron
Greatland Managing Director, Shaun Day, commented: “We are delighted to immediately commence our maiden drilling campaign at the Paterson South Project. The rapid commencement of drilling following entry into the farm-in and joint venture arrangement with Rio Tinto Exploration is testament to both the high quality of the targets and Greatland’s drive to rapidly unlock greater value from our Paterson Province exploration portfolio.”
Overview of the Paterson South Project tenements and drilling campaign
Greatland has commenced its first drilling programme at the Paterson South Project within four weeks of entering into the farm-in and joint venture arrangement with Rio Tinto Exploration and becoming project manager. The Company will be applying the technical knowledge built through the discovery of Havieron to the Paterson South Project. The application and interpretation of geophysical surveys (magnetic and electromagnetic) was key in the Havieron discovery and is central to Greatland’s strategy at Paterson South.
Figure 1: Paterson South Project tenements
Diamond drilling is underway on the highly prospective Stingray target which is a magnetic anomaly 10km along strike N-NW of the Havieron magnetic anomaly, itself associated with mineralisation.
Further, reverse circulation (RC) drilling is planned at the Decka target, which is a basement magnetic and conductive anomaly 20km NW of Havieron. Both targets show consistent periodicity in that Stingray is ~10km from Havieron and Decka is ~10km from Stingray on the same trend. This may indicate a consistent paragenesis for all three anomalies (Figure 2).
Stingray
The Stingray target is the first magnetic target N-NW of Havieron and is modelled to be significantly shallower than the Havieron magnetic body (Figure 2). The anomaly is inversion modelled to have an estimated length of 3km (at a magnetic susceptibility of 0.0023SI). The lack of a bedrock conductor at Stingray (Figure 3) can be explained by the interpreted deeper, highly conductive cover which masks any bedrock response.
Only one drill hole has tested the magnetic anomaly at the Stingray target to date. That hole, completed by Rio Tinto Exploration in 2021, intersected anomalous copper and bismuth. The current hole being drilled by Greatland is planned to test the magnetic anomaly 600m from the previous drilling and will extend to approximately 750m down hole.
Figure 2: Longsection at 460,000mE showing magnetic models to scale for Havieron, Stingray and Decka. Note: inversion shells are displayed for different susceptibilities due to availability. Smaller values of susceptibility will have larger shells for the same anomaly. No inversion has yet been completed for Decka so a forward modelled body is shown.
Figure 3: Budjidowns tenement basement magnetic and EM (conductivity) responses
Atlantis
Beyond the Stingray and Decka targets, Greatland’s next priority is Atlantis which lies 6km along strike to the N-NW of Decka (Figure 3) and has no effective drilling on +2km strike of magnetically anomalous targets. A review of this prospect is currently underway and drilling will be planned to test these targets.
Greater Paterson South exploration programme
Work is underway to review historic work across the rest of the +1500km2 Paterson South Project tenure and develop access to several other tenements to allow on-ground work to commence there as statutory and heritage approvals are obtained.
