Dacian Gold Ltd (ASX: DCN) has announced the maiden Mineral Resource for its newly discovered Phoenix Ridge Deposit at its Mt Morgans Gold Operation (MMGO), located near Laverton in Western Australia.
Located just 15km west of the Mt Morgans treatment plant, Phoenix Ridge was discovered earlier this year after Daclan undertook successful testing below the Morgans North open pit along the same high-grade shoot directions observed in the Beresford and Allanson gold mines, located to the south of the open pit.
Dacian Gold Executive Chairman, Rohan Williams, said the Inferred Mineral Resource estimate for Phoenix Ridge above a lower cut-off grade of 2 g/t is 481,000 tonnes @ 8.1 g/t for 125,000 ounces.
“After making this shallow discovery earlier this year, we have moved quickly to deliver what is a very strong maiden Resource for Phoenix Ridge, particularly given its impressive grade of more than 8g/t,” Mr Williams said.
Given its proximity to the Mt Morgans treatment plant, grade and location close to surface, we will commence infill-drilling as soon as possible with the aim of defining a new high-grade additional production source for Mt Morgans.
“We also believe that there is excellent potential to find additional high-grade mineralisation closer to the surface in areas that have not been drilled immediately above the new Resource, plus longer-term potential to find extensions and repeats down-plunge within an emerging high-grade trend.”
Background and Introduction
The maiden Phoenix Ridge Inferred Mineral Resource estimate, is contained within a recently discovered mineralised Banded Iron Formation (BIF) unit, now called the Phoenix Ridge BIF.
The Phoenix Ridge BIF is one of a number of mineralised BIF units that occurs within a 70-120m wide BIF-dominated stratigraphic package that is also host to the BIF units that contain the Beresford and Allanson gold mines (Westralia Mine Area), located immediately to the south of Phoenix Ridge.
The addition of the Phoenix Ridge Mineral Resource to the existing MMGO Mineral Resource of 3.5 million ounces takes the combined MMGO Mineral Resource to 55.2Mt @ 2.1g/t Au for 3.65 million ounces.
Geology of the Phoenix Ridge Gold Deposit
The Phoenix Ridge BIF represents a previously untested BIF unit that lies in the footwall below the well- tested BIF unit that hosts the orebody mined in the Morgans North open pit. The Phoenix Ridge BIF is in a broadly similar stratigraphic position as the Allanson deposit, currently in production.