Horizon nails nickel sulphides in first hole

Multi-element explorer Horizon Minerals has hit nickel sulphides in its first hole at its Euston prospect within the company’s wholly-owned Cannon project near Kalgoorlie in WA. Preliminary assays of the 4m nickel intercept revealed encouraging grades of over 1 per cent nickel, 607 parts per million copper and 250ppm cobalt from 160m.

Five holes for 990m were drilled to test new targets and validate historical nickel results at Horizon’s Euston and Blair North prospects with assays from the remaining four holes pending.

Horizon Minerals Managing Director, Jon Price said: “It’s very encouraging that the first hole returned at Euston has hit significant nickel mineralisation which is a fantastic result. We look forward to receiving further assays from the outstanding holes and the single metre results.”

The mineralised interval at Euston appears to line up “reasonably well” with a historical intercept of 4m at 1.78 per cent nickel and provides the company with valuable information for follow-up drilling as it looks to target thicker high-grade nickel mineralisation.

At Blair North, about 500m to the north-east of the inaugural hit, two drill holes were plunged to a depth of 22m, aiming to validate the historical intercepts of 2m grading an impressive 3.94 per cent nickel, 709ppm cobalt and 1825ppm copper from 161m and 3m at 2.62 per cent nickel, 542ppm cobalt, 2400ppm copper from 156m.

Horizon believes both prospects were not adequately followed up as they were overshadowed by the high-grade Cannon gold discovery in 2008, leaving the door ajar for more nickel success at depth.

The Cannon project contributes a sweet 32,070 ounces at 4.3 g/t to Horizon’s total gold inventory of 1.15 million ounces.

Assays are pending for Horizon’s pair of holes at Blair North with one of them being cased for a planned downhole electromagnetic, or “DHEM” survey.

DHEM surveys are a common exploration tool used to help identify potential massive sulphide conductors and the company plans to use the method to assist in drill targeting.

Such a survey is currently underway at the explorer’s Golden Ridge project, 9km to the west, and will be followed by one at Cannon.

At Golden Ridge, seven RC holes for 1530m were recently drilled to test for nickel fertility and potential volcanogenic massive sulphide mineralisation.

Preliminary assay results revealed a 4m hit 0.37 per cent nickel and 398ppm at Golden Ridge. Three holes have been selected for downhole surveys, with one already complete.

The company is expecting to receive a significant amount of preliminary composite gold and nickel results in the coming weeks and intends to submit the single-metre samples once it has the composites in hand.

Horizon will pass the drill rig over its other regional assets in the coming months before recommencing drilling at Cannon and Golden Ridge in the September quarter.

With most of its portfolio in Western Australia, it appears Horizon has chosen its postcode well as the authoritative body Geoscience Australia says about 60 per cent of the nation’s gold and 96 per cent of its nickel occurs in the West.

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