WA Gold Limited has kicked off reconnaissance aircore drilling at its Bullabulling project, 30 kilometres west of Coolgardie in Western Australia's Eastern Goldfields - a target on its doorstep hard to ignore.
The Bullabulling shear zone is one of WA’s most prolific gold-bearing structures, which hosts the adjacent Bullabulling gold mine operated by ASX-listed Minerals 260, with a resource of 130 million tonnes at one gram per tonne (g/t) gold for 4.5 million ounces.
WA Gold says it believes a highly prospective structural corridor that has never been systematically tested continues northward beneath relatively shallow transported cover into the company's own tenure. The current program is designed to find out whether that interpretation is right.
The company’s maiden campaign will comprise 46 aircore holes for 3680 metres across eight drill lines to probe beneath shallow transported cover, where modelling suggests the Bullabulling shear zone continues into WA Gold’s tenure.
Final hole depths will be determined by rock conditions encountered during drilling. Unlike many greenfield exploration campaigns, WA Gold isn’t drilling blind. The program was generated from a detailed geological and geophysical review undertaken with specialists, Resource Potentials. The consultant identified several compelling targets, which have received little or no effective historical testing, largely because a veneer of transported cover has masked the underlying geology.
The program will also follow up historical gold anomalies that were never properly tested, including one particular hole drilled by Resolute Resources on the western margin of the shear zone, which intriguingly finished in mineralisation with a five-metre end-of-hole intercept grading 0.12g/t gold from 40m. The hole was never followed up, and no drilling was completed further east into the interpreted structural corridor. That untested ground forms one of the first drill tests in the current program.
Encouragingly, previous drilling within the Bullabulling North area has already demonstrated the system is capable of yielding high-grade gold, returning intercepts including 2m at an eye-catching 18.1g/t gold from 34m, 12m at a tidy 2.3g/t gold from 53m and 4m at a serious 10.12g/t gold from 32m.
WA Gold Limited chief executive officer Ben Pollard said: “The commencement of drilling at Bullabulling is an exciting milestone for WA Gold as we begin testing what we believe is the northern continuation of one of Western Australia’s most prolific gold-bearing structures. Our recent exploration review identified several compelling targets beneath shallow transported cover that have seen little or no effective historical drill testing. This program is designed to test those interpretations and determine whether the Bullabulling mineralised system extends into WA Gold’s tenure.”
In a vote of confidence from the industry, leading goldfield’s drilling contractor VM Drilling has agreed to undertake a portion of the program in exchange for equity in WA Gold rather than cash. The tidy arrangement preserves the company's cash position while keeping exploration moving.
Gold mineralisation in the district is characterised by stacked lodes within greenstones that extend from near surface and dip shallowly - a classic orogenic gold situation. Although gold can occur across all rock types, it favours mafic and iron-rich host rocks. Interestingly, higher sulphide and silica content do not automatically translate into higher gold grades, hinting that structural controls may play the dominant role.
Logistically, the project is well placed; sitting in a mature mining corridor with ready access to road, power and processing infrastructure, with the Great Eastern Highway running directly through the tenement package.
Once the current drilling wraps up, WA Gold plans to fly a sub-audio magnetics (SAM) survey during the September quarter to further refine the structural interpretation and generate the next round of drill targets.
Importantly for punters, Bullabulling is not the company’s only operational gold project. Assays from the first three diamond holes plunged into the 100 per cent owned Abercromby gold project near Wiluna in Western Australia’s north-eastern goldfields are expected in the coming days.
With two active exploration fronts generating news simultaneously, the company is setting itself up for a busy reporting period.
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