Helix Resources Limited (ASX: HLX) has announced a series of highly encouraging activities at the Company’s wholly owned tenements along the Collerina Trend, located in the prolific copper-endowed Cobar region of NSW.
More copper! The drilling at the CZ deposit continues to generate positive results as we have not only identified a new shallow oxide layer but have now confirmed that it extends west and east of the existing deposit. We are making considerable progress in outlining additional mineralisation at CZ,” Managing Director, Mike Rosenstreich, said.
“Not only are we discovering more copper but we are expanding our footprint by consolidating our landholding in the area with the application for three exploration licenses covering more than 670km2, some of which adjoins Aeris Resources’ Tritton Copper Operations to the north.
“I am very excited by these activities and while the task of core logging and geological modelling is being undertaken, we will look to move the rig back to Canbelego where Helix discovered massive copper sulphides in our last campaign.
“We will continue to keep shareholders abreast of our latest developments with further assays and drilling to come.”
Drilling at CZ Deposit
Drilling was completed at CZ on November 29, for a total of 20 drill holes comprising 1,420.6 metres of reverse circulation (RC) and 2,005.8 metres of diamond drill core.
The RC program successfully identified new zones of shallow, high-grade, ‘oxide’ copper mineralisation to the east and west of the CZ Deposit. Diamond drilling also intersected oxide and primary base-metal sulphide zones for metallurgical sampling as well as various drill tests for extensions and repetitions of the existing sulphide-copper shoot structures.
Western shallow copper (Cu) zone
Additional assays have been received for RC drill holes testing for shallow ‘oxide’ copper mineralisation at the western end of the CZ deposit:
- 6m at 0.23% Cu from 25m (CORC143)
- 4m at 1.2% Cu from 40m, within 32m at 0.57% Cu from 31m (CORC144)
Previous drillholes (pre-2021) in this area also have indications of oxide mineralisation. However, most of these drillholes, particularly to the southeast, have not been geologically logged and also appear to be significantly ‘under-sampled’. There are clearly important data-gaps in this area which are currently being resolved to fully understand the geological controls and copper potential.
Eastern shallow Cu zone
A new, shallow, open-ended, high-grade copper-oxide zone to the southeast of the CZ deposit was reported, with intercepts such as:
- 7m at 2.64% Cu & 1.18 g/t gold (Au) within 25m at 0.94% Cu from 20m (CORC141)
- 7m at 2.83% Cu within 30m at 0.86% Cu from 14m (CORC140)
- 3m at 2.74% Cu within 8m at 1.17% Cu from 32m (CORC139)
Two additional RC holes (to complete the current allocation of approved drilling) were undertaken to follow-up this new zone. The following visual estimates are recorded as part of the geological logging:
- 14m interval from 34m of malachite and possible chalcocite (copper ‘oxide’ minerals) (CORC0150)
- 4m interval from 25m of malachite and possible chalcocite (CORC0151)
These drill holes have visually confirmed ‘oxide’ copper mineralisation between the two assayed intervals in holes CORC140 and CORC139, and indicate that the mineralisation remains open to the southeast – albeit narrower, but warrants further testing.
Main CZ sulphide shoot
Sampling of the diamond tails for drill holes CORC0146 and CORDC0149 is in progress at the Ccmpany’s new exploration base in Orange, NSW. There is a backlog of logging and sampling of the diamond drill holes which the recent occupation of the new exploration base and the imminent commissioning of the new automated core saw should help alleviate.
Typical for all exploration programs in the current environment, there is a 4 to 5 week waiting time for assay results to be reported by the labs which will see results continue to roll-out over the coming months. This includes assays for the four metallurgical diamond core drill holes with results for 497 samples submitted in November expected in January 2022.
Down hole electromagnetic (DHEM) surveys are planned on holes CORC0137 and CORC0146, which subject to the weather and EM crew availability will be completed this month.
At CZ in particular, the exploration team is revisiting the geological model with the ongoing addition of new data from the current drilling and geophysical survey programs as well as from the logging of a significant number of ‘pre-2021’ CZ drill holes that were never logged. The updated geological model will be used to plan the next round of CZ drilling and underpin a revised Mineral Resource estimate – likely sometime mid-next year.
