Thomson Resources’ (ASX:TMZ) resource consultants, AMC, has commenced calculation of an updated JORC 2012 MRE at the 100% owned Silver Spur Mine in NSW, Australia.
Analysis of historic geophysics and recent structural interpretations by the company’s geoscience consultants, Global Ore Discovery, has highlighted a series of compelling exploration targets in the mine area.
Silver Spur is an historic high-grade silver polymetallic mine located 1.5 km south of the Twin Hills silver deposit, within the 100% owned Texas Silver District.
Executive Chairman, David Williams, said the Texas district is a key project in the Company’s New England Fold Belt (NEFB) Hub and Spoke central processing strategy, where Thomson has the objective of consolidating 100 MozAgEq of JORC 2012 MRE surrounding a central processing facility, as an initial milestone towards realising its Hub and Spoke strategy for this region.
Our second mineral resource estimate – Silver Spur – is now on the way with AMC. At the same time the Mt Gunyanrelog and drill data validation is advancing a pace. The work undertaken so far is showing Silver Spur to be an exciting area with tremendous upside potential and we have the feeling that this sleeper is going to offer up a lot,” Mr Williams said.
“The recent work by the Global Ore team as part of the Resource Estimate project has thrown up exciting exploration potential which has been confirmed down dip and adjacent to the Silver Spur mine. There is also a very interesting district scale picture emerging of the larger Texas Silver district exploration potential which shows there is a lot more to come in this area.”
Silver Spur Exploration and Previous Mineral Resource Estimates
A series of companies have completed 7,737 m of drilling in 76 holes at the Silver Spur Mine and 5,772 m of drilling in 98 holes at the nearby Silver Spur North prospect between 1976 and 2012.
In 1998 Rimfire Pacific Mining delivered a non-JORC resource and later that year a resource update based on Rimfire’s drill results. In 2004 Macmin restated the Rimfire resource under the JORC 2004 reporting code1.
Between 1995 and 2012 Rimfire, Macmin and Alcyone Resources drilled a total of 6,881 m in 71 holes of DDH, RC, percussion and RAB drill holes into the Silver Spur deposit, and 5,672 m in 98 holes into the Silver Spur North prospect.
None of the Macmin or Alcyone drilling has been incorporated into previous MREs for the Silver Spur Mine and no previous MRE has included an estimate for the Silver Spur North mineralisation.
AMC Consultants have commenced calculation of the updated Silver Spur JORC 2012 MRE as the next step in Thomson’s objective to deliver JORC 2012 MRE’s for its New England Fold Belt hub and spoke projects.
Silver Spur Exploration Potential
Mr Williamson said, notwithstanding the many years of exploration at Silver Spur, the mine and district remain underexplored with compelling exploration targets adjacent to the known deposit and untested targets becoming evident as Thomson’s new geological data is integrated and interpreted with historic exploration information.
New 3D models of Silver Spur Mine structure, historically mined shoots and exploration drilling confirm that the mineralisation is potentially open to depth and has highlighted a series of near resource structural settings that warrant drill testing.
Recovery of historic district scale exploration data into a GIS database is ongoing. Initial integrated interpretation with new structural and deposit models has highlighted a series of compelling untested geophysical anomalies outlined by a 1960’s Carpentaria Exploration IP survey and a small 2012 EM survey for Alcyone Resources5 that extended to the south of the Silver Spur mine.
The IP (and EM) surveys outline anomalies associated with the known Silver Spur mineralisation but also outline a series of anomalies lying along the mapped project of the Stokes Fault to the north and south of the deposit. The IP survey also highlights a large NE orient chargeability anomaly located approximately 400 m to the east of the mine. None of these anomalies have been previously drill tested.
Thomson has planned ground follow-up and mapping in these areas and given the age of the IP survey and the localised nature of the existing EM survey, Thomson has contracted Toowoomba based Planetary Geophysics to complete a new survey of the district to confirm and better define the anomalies prior to drill testing.