A speculative drilling programme in the Northern Territory has paid off Mandrake Resources Limited (ASX: MAN) with a number of precious metal hits at the Berinka Pine Creek Gold Project.
Managing Director, James Allchurch, said the company elected to test two greenfields frontier targets at the Berinka and the recently completed reverse circulation (RC) drilling programme has returned high grade gold, silver and copper intercepts.
Mandrake made the decision to undertake a relatively speculative frontier drilling programme at Berinka based on limited historic surface geochemistry and structural trends identified on magnetics,” Mr Allchurch said.
“To have drilling return coincident high-grade gold, silver and copper on a gabbro/granite structural contact in our first limited programme is very exciting for the company.
“Specialist downhole imaging has been crucial in improving our understanding of the orientation of structures and veining and this information will be used to plan further drilling.”
RC hole FBRC005 drilled at the Vegetation Anomaly returned: 3m @ 1.8g/t Au, 32 g/t Ag and 2.1% Cu from 124m including; 1m @ 3.7 g/t Au, 69 g/t Ag and 3.1% Cu from 124m
A second Vegetation Anomaly hole, FBRC004, returned 9m @ 0.31 g/t Au from 22m
A third hole, drilled at the Terry’s Gap target recorded 7m @ 0.32 g/t Au from 120m.
Mr Allchurch said the discovery of high grade Au mineralisation at the Vegetation Anomaly which, contrary to previous work in the area is associated with high Ag/Cu concentrations, may indicate a potentially different mineralising system/event.
He said the generation of the positive results from a small RC programme designed to scout prospects with little to no previous work is outstanding and has confirmed the gold prospectivity of the Berinka Project and compelled the company to complete further drilling.
Meanwhile, prompted by enquiries from European-based investors, Mandrake has dual-listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange.
The dual listing facilitates greater exposure to European markets and increases reach to investors in other jurisdictions.
