Xantippe Resources Limited (ASX: XTC) is planning to use exploration techniques never before used at Southern Cross as it prepares to commence Phase 2 of its exploration programme at its recently acquired gold project in Western Australia.
The extensive campaign is aiming to defined priority drill targets for the next phase of RC drilling, indicatively scheduled to commence in early Q3 2020.
XTC’s maiden drilling programme, completed in April 2020, initially tested three targets – Xantippe, Glendower and Treasury South – and was successful in intersecting broad zones of gold mineralisation.
The company’s current aim is to move towards the Phase 2 drilling programme at the project. In order to prioritise targets for this programme, the company will immediately undertake the following core activities, including:
- Implementing the recommendations of the high-level data review undertaken by Expedio where all historical data will be subjected to a check and validation process before it is compiled into a master database;
- Consolidating and merging ground magnetic surveys completed with publicly available historical datasets and conduct advanced processing and imaging of merged magnetic datasets. This will be supplemented by any new data that can be purchased or undertaken to provide a complete survey at high density; and
- Conducting a geological review and target update, utilising the newly processed ground magnetic dataset.
These core activities are anticipated to be completed by end Q2 and will be immediately followed by drill evaluation of at least three targets defined as most prospective. This work will culminate in the next round of RC drilling which is expected to be carried out early in Q3 2020.
The Company has previously reported potential high priority targets – Boodarding, Battle North and Alpine/Roma.
Xantippe’s Managing Director, Richard Henning, said that while these targets have previously delivered encouraging high- grade gold intersections, XTC will not rely solely on these to determine targets for the upcoming drill campaign and like all other potential targets will be vigorously analysed as part of the upcoming work programme.
We are spoiled to have a depth of promising walk-up gold targets already demonstrated within our portfolio, and remain funded to go and drill priority targets in the near term,” Mr Henning said.
“Timing has never been better to get busy, with the Australian gold price increasing by more than A$500/oz since we announced our transformational acquisition of the tenement package in this prolific gold region in December 2019.
“We have a plan to capitalise on the large amount of historical and public data available leading into the next phase of drilling to maximise our chances of success, and will spend the next several weeks consolidating this data to generate an updated geological model to assist with our drill targeting.”
Mr Henning said ddvanced methods to be undertaken by XTC – including geochemistry, litho-geochemistry and spectral geology – have never previously been applied to the Southern Cross Project. With the application of these methods, the Company expects to significantly enhance the Project’s prospectivity.
“It was a significant achievement to get our maiden drilling programme completed in good time and without any logistical issues. Having defined the historical mineralised zones, we will now use interpretative techniques to define, as accurately as possible, a second round of drilling,” Mr Henning said.
Southern Cross Greenstone Belt – Overview
XTC’s tenements cover around 30km of strike of the Southern Cross Greenstone Belt, which has historically produced around 15Moz gold, predominantly from the Marvel Loch and Southern Cross centres, both of which are in operation to varying extents.
