Cannindah up 21pc on gigantic copper hit

First assays from an ongoing drilling program at the historic Mt Cannindah copper-gold-silver project in central Queensland are in – and they look very good.

The recent increase in copper prices has underlined the significant value of Cannindah Resources’ (ASX:CAE) brownfields ‘Mt Cannindah’ copper-gold-silver project, which boasts an existing JORC resource of 5.5 million tonnes @ 0.93% copper and significant exploration upside.

The company is currently undertaking a 1,450m drilling program to explore both new and existing areas.

Mt Cannindah project: location of identified resources & known targets.

Success has come quickly, with the top portion of hole two hitting 117m at 1.01% copper, 0.39g/t gold and 28g/t silver from 34m to 151m.

Assays are pending for the subsequent 180m interval from 150m to 330m. This bottom portion “contains visual primary copper mineralisation, many metres of which looks similar in tenor to the 34m-151m interval”, the company says.

Coming next – hole 3 (21CAEDD003) — completed for 762.2m vs the planned 250m — has also encountered significant copper, the company says. The exciting visuals of the core has driven the significant increase in meterage.

The hole was drilled to the drill rig’s capacity and ended in copper-rich sulphidic breccia.

It is now the deepest hole drilled within the Mt Cannindah mine area, the company says.

“Copper assays are awaited, [but] preliminary tests from visual estimates of chalcopyrite, and PXRF analyses of sludge samples to date, all indicate significant copper values should be returned over large sections of at least the first 500m or so of hole 21CAEDD003,” Cannindah says.

Results received to date underpin potential extension of the current 5.5Mt JORC resource, with the supergene zones offering further grade upside upon incorporation.

“Although assays are needed to confirm the significance of the discovery, CAE are highly encouraged that this strategy has been successful and a major extension to the known Cu-Au-Ag resources at Mt Cannindah mine will likely follow from the drilling of hole 21CAEDD003,” the company says.

“This goal has eluded the major mining houses that have previously explored Mt Cannindah.”

New diamond drilling is yet to occur on other targets such as Cannindah East, where the explorer is also expecting encouraging results. Cannindah East has a non JORC gold resource of 245,000t grading 2.8g/t.

The $77m market cap stock is up 383% year-to-date.