Victorian gold explorer North Stawell Minerals Ltd (ASX:NSM) has confirmed the discover of shallow, high-grade gold from preliminary drill results from its Wildwood drill programme north of Stawell.
Drill hole RC007 returned 10m @ 3.51g/t from 30m including 1m @ 16.65g/tAu from 30mwithin a broader interval of 4m @ 6.88g/t from 30m
CEO, Steven Tambanis, said Hole RC007 returned highly encouraging gold results from the bottom 10m of the 40m hole which ended in gold mineralisation. NSM is still waiting for assay results for the upper portion of the hole.
RC007 delivered highly encouraging gold assays from a 10m interval from 30-40m downhole with the hole finishing in gold mineralisation. We look forward to reporting the rest of the assay results from RC007 as they are returned from the laboratory,” Mr Tambanis said.
“Additional drill lines are being planned for this shallow portion of the basalt dome and we note that there are significant areas of the Wildwood basalt that are as yet undrilled.
“We regard the Stawell Mineralised Corridor to be one of Australia’s most prospective and historic gold provinces and have a target rich environment to explore over the next two years with an experienced and enthusiastic team.
“Many prospects are already demonstrated to be gold mineralised and we look forward to commencing regional target exploration once the bulk of our first Wildwood drilling is completed in early 2021.
“Geochemical and geophysical programmes planned during the December quarter will commence during the current quarter.”
The Wildwood Basalt dome has been intermittently explored and drilled over the past 35 years by WMC Resources and its successors – owners of Stawell Gold Mines. An initial JORC compliant inferred mineral resource estimate of 55kOz @ 2.0g/t Au has been developed from historic drilling to 2012 and NSM sees potential to materially increase the resource base by drilling down-dip, along-strike and down-plunge of known mineralisation.
This initial 10,000m drill programme at Wildwood is designed to test for additional mineralisation outside of the historical mineralised envelopes.
Drilling is currently proceeding to plan with three rigs in the field with 2,277m drilled in January and >2,000m drilled to date in February.
Management said that over 1,000 drill samples submitted for assay with results expected to be released during the current quarter
