Lunnon Metals uncovers hidden gold structure during nickel drilling

A maiden drill program targeting nickel at the historic ‘Foster’ mine – a key asset at Lunnon’s Kambalda nickel project — hits a previously unrecognised gold structure.

Two holes were planned, targeting the ~500m gap above and between the end of the ‘Foster Decline’ and the current 16,000 tonnes of nickel metal resource at ‘Foster South’.

Partial assay results from the first hole — 7.84m at 1.50 g/t gold from 166m — identify a previously unrecognised and significant structure, Lunnon Metals (ASX:LM8) says.

Three subsequent holes also intersected the new structure, with assays pending.

This structure has now been defined over an area of at least 300m down dip and 150m across strike by the four separate diamond holes.

The close association between nickel and gold at the Kambalda/St Ives camp is well documented, Lunnon managing director Ed Ainscough says.

Total historical production of nickel and gold across the entire district is estimated to be approaching 1.6 Mt of nickel metal and close to 15 Moz of gold.

“As the previous Chief Geologist at St Ives in WMC and Gold Fields days, it is always exciting to intersect structures with gold potential, especially given the significant gold endowment surrounding the KNP,” Ainscough says.

“The Victory-Defiance Complex and the Argo-Hamlet-Athena camp are to our immediate north and south, just 1km and 1.5km respectively.

“Importantly though from a nickel perspective, to discover a new structure, follow up and hit the same structure in three other holes does give us confidence that these structures are real and supports our hypothesis that the prospective nickel contact may have been faulted or ‘shuffled’ — a key premise behind the targeting of this initial campaign.”

Next steps: nickel and gold exploration

The next important step of completing down hole transient electromagnetic (DHTEM) surveys on both FOS21DD_001 and CD 3300 will occur as soon as crew availability allows, the company says.

Some sulphide minerals are good electrical conductors. Explorers can pick up these ‘anomalies’ during DHTEM surveys.

Planning of any follow-up drilling for nickel will be subject to the outcome of these DHTEM surveys and the final nickel assay results returned from the two diamond holes that intersected the contact.

In regard to the gold mineralisation reported, repeat ‘screen fire’ assays will be completed on the sample rejects.

This assaying will assess the presence of coarse gold and therefore the potential that the assays received have under, or over, reported the gold grades.

Once this exercise is complete and coupled with the gold assay results from the remaining holes, Lunnon Metals will be able to assess the significance of this new structure and whether follow-up drilling is warranted to delineate a potential gold resource.

This article was developed in collaboration with Lunnon, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.

This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.