Junior explorer, Native Mineral Resources has put its foot on what looks to be a compelling exploration tenement prospective for copper, gold, zinc, lead and silver, some 100 kilometres west of Cairns in north Queensland. The property is host to a mineralised breccia pipe, named the “Maneater Breccia”, where a single historical drill hole intercepted more than 300 metres of sulphides down-hole.
Drilled in the 1990s to a depth of 365.8m, the company says some sections of the drill core reportedly show more than 80 per cent sulphides and even up to 100 per cent massive sulphides at about the 240m mark.
The sulphide assemblage in the hole is dominated by lead, zinc and silver at shallower levels, with copper in the form of chalcopyrite increasing at depth from134m down-hole.
Notably, Native Minerals says the sulphide assemblage in the hole is a little similar to the upper part of the one-million ounce plus Mt Wright gold deposit, also sitting within a breccia pipe some 380km away.
The company believes a mineralised body may lie beneath the limits of the historical drill hole and will look to test this theory in time.
It will target gold and copper mineralisation below the lead, zinc and silver mineralisation identified in the hole.
The licence application takes in some 62 square kilometres of land with the Maneater Breccia located in the central part of the tenure.
Management says the breccia measures a hefty 500m by 250m and outcrops as a prominent rocky hill. Intriguingly, historical rock chip sampling from a vein near the breccia returned elevated levels of mineralisation, including 2.05 grams per tonne gold, 65 g/t silver and 14.9 per cent lead.
Native Mineral Resources Managing Director, Blake Cannavo said:“Preliminary work completed by our technical team suggests the Maneater Breccia has considerable potential to host further sulfide mineralisation at depth. Once the tenement is successfully granted, we will be undertaking an exploration campaign to further test the surface geology, prior to drilling to test mineralisation at depth. Planning is well advanced for the 2022 field season in North Queensland, and we look forward to providing further updates on our exploration strategy to advance several encouraging copper targets in due course.”
The new tenure complements Native Minerals’ flagship Palmerville copper project, some 200km north-west of Cairns.
Palmerville takes in a whopping 1,820 square kilometres of land lying within the seriously well-endowed Chillagoe geological formation.
The company has identified 11 priority targets along 130km of strike at the project.
A recent sampling campaign at Palmerville delivered multiple high grade copper results from several prospects, including 19.99 per cent copper at Glenroy, 7.99 per cent copper at Fairlight and 10.06 per cent copper at Leane’s.
The company plans to get its boots dirty with an exploration campaign on the new tenement during the north Queensland field season early next year. Proposed works include a diamond drill hole to test deeper levels of the Maneater Breccia for copper and gold mineralisation.
Simultaneously, it intends to return to Palmerville to follow-up on the high-grade copper showings at Glenroy, Fairlight and Leane’s.
With the new tenement application, Native Mineral Resources appears to have added another exciting copper-gold prospect to a treasure-trove of copper targets already under its belt in north Queensland.
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By Matt Birney
