Kingwest Resources has continued to reel off a string of high-grade gold hits from multiple deposits as part of an onslaught of resource definition drilling at its historic Menzies gold project about 120 kilometres north of Kalgoorlie-Boulder as it edges closer to an upgraded global resource estimate.
The latest clutch of stand-out RC drill intersections – this time from the Lady Shenton, Lady Harriet and Yunndaga auriferous systems – included 11m grading 7.13 grams per tonne gold from 62m, 2m at 20.71 g/t from 91m, 1m at 26.78 g/t from 40m and 1m at 22.42 g/t from 88m.
Other notable assays included 5m at 11.72 g/t from 46m, 9m at 6.00 g/t from 91m, 10m at 4.42 g/t from 15m, 2m at 16.16 g/t from 79m, 3m at 7.01 g/t from 81m, and 6m at 3.62 g/t from 12m.
Kingwest Chief Executive Officer, Ed Turner said: “We are now seeing coherent zones of high-grade mineralisation that remain open-ended and which expand the previously defined boundaries of the resources. The drilling is still mainly only to a depth of 100m below surface.”
“The increased scale and higher grade of the identified gold lodes will translate to a resource upgrade scheduled for later in Q1 2021 when the (drilling) campaign is completed and all assays have been received.”
“The shallow infill and extensional results obtained will be used to evaluate the immediate open-pit mining potential to determine the short-term economic potential of the resources. Additional deeper drilling will continue to evaluate the longer-term underground mining potential of the Menzies deposits.”
Earlier this year, the ASX-listed Perth-based gold explorer, which only acquired the project last year, delivered a combined near-surface gold resource for seven deposits at Menzies, mainly in the inferred category, of 4.78 million tonnes going 2.08 g/t for 319,900 ounces of contained gold.
Kingwest says it is in the process of completing the massive infill and extensional drilling program, which so far in the second half of calendar 2020 has totalled 145 RC holes for an aggregate 13,644m. A further 30 holes totalling approximately 4,000m remain to be drilled.
According to the company, the higher density of this year’s drilling is expected to upgrade the classification level of the overall resource converting a large amount from the inferred to indicated status. It is also hoping for a lift in the size of the resource.
The Menzies project area consists of a contiguous ground holding over a strike length in excess of 15km that takes in a litany of brownfields gold prospects. Its high-grade gold deposits were historically mined, and according to the company, the gold targets left behind still harbour plenty of upside exploration potential for high-grade extensions or repeats having sat largely dormant for a couple of decades.
From 1995 to 1999, Menzies produced 145,000 ounces of gold from ore that averaged a grade of 2.6 g/t.
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By Matt Birney
