Elysium Commences Further Drilling at Historic Lloyd’s Prospect

Emerging mineral exploration company Elysium Resources (ASX:EYM) has mounted a follow-up campaign to further test the extent of mineralisation at its flagship Burraga project, near Bathurst in NSW.

On Tuesday, Elysium announced the commencement of reverse circulation (RC) drilling at its Lloyd’s mine copper-lead-zinc prospect. Depending on drilling conditions, the two-hole, 600-metre RC program is scheduled for completion in a week.

The RC drilling follows a preliminary exploration in August, in which Elysium intersected amounts of copper, zinc and silver. Elysium is now seeking to test the extent of mineralisation further north and this marks the first time in 33 years RC drilling will be conducted in this area of the mine.

With the copper price climbing to four-year highs, Elysium’s continued drilling is well timed. The historic Lloyd’s Copper mine, which is located on Elysium’s fully-owned land, produced 19,443 tonnes of copper from the 1800s to the 1960s, at grades of 3.5% to 4.14%. While this mining was to a shallow depth of 100 metres, the deposit is thought to extend further down dip, with adjacent interpreted copper mineralisation known as stacked lenses.

The tenements are on the famed Lachlan Fold belt, which houses some of Australia’s biggest gold mines including Newcrest Mining’s Cadia and Evolution Mining’s Cowal pit. Based around the Lloyd’s mine, Elysium’s five hole phase-one program returned promising copper grades, including a one metre intersect grading 9.9% copper, 0.4% zinc and 50.4 grams a tonne of silver.

Elysium’s three adjoining exploration licences, totalling 220 square kilometres, include the Lucky Draw gold mine that handled 1.41 million tonnes of ore (grading 4.2 grams a tonne) between 1998 and 1991.The ground also includes the highly prospective Isabella and Hackneys Creek gold targets. While these areas hold huge potential at a time of firming gold prices, the company currently is devoting its resources to the Lloyd’s project. Across its Burraga prospects, Elysium has set a conceptual exploration target of 10mt, grading 2% copper equivalent.

A feature of the Burraga project is a tailings dam containing a ready to process resource of 234,000t at an average 1.25% copper, with slag heaps containing a further 140,000t at 0.9% copper. If the mine is restarted, those resources could be a potential source of immediate revenue for Elysium.

Elysium is well funded after a recent $3.26 million placement. A board overhaul earlier this year saw the company divest its Malang copper-gold prospect in Indonesia and renew its focus on the Burraga project.

Elysium Resources expects assay results from the Burraga project by the end of October 2017.

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