Navarre drilling identifies potential to add two satellite pits at Mt Carlton

Drilling has already identified the potential for two satellite open pits to deliver significant gold resource growth at Navarre’s recently acquired Mt Carlton Operation.

Standout high-grade hits include a thick, 25m intersection grading 21.4 grams per tonne (g/t) gold from 75m and 4m at 46.2g/t gold from 82m at the Delta deposit and 3m at 47.2g/t gold from 81m at the BV7 deposit.

These and other significant intercepts from the 111 holes completed during 2021 across the two prospects will be used by the company to underpin a new resource and ore reserve estimate for the Mt Carlton Operation by March 2022.

This will include updates from other deposits such as V2, A39, Telstra Hill and Mount Carlton United.

Navarre Minerals (ASX:NML) only last week completed the acquisition of the Mt Carlton Operations, injecting immediate gold production and cash flow.

“The company is extremely pleased with the tenor and width of the high-grade gold results being returned from the Crush Creek drilling program,” managing director Ian Holland said.

“These promising results reinforce our belief that the delineated mineralisation has the potential to significantly extend mine life at Mt Carlton.

“We believe Delta and BV7 have the potential to become two standalone satellite open pit mines, just 30 kilometres south of the Mt Carlton mill.”

Assays are pending for a further 12 holes completed at BV7 that targeted high-grade mineralisation adjacent to the existing resource.

Crush Creek currently has a resource of 126,000oz of gold grading 3.5g/t.

Positive drill results and high-grade continuity

Drilling at Crush Creek has focused on understanding and expanding the Inferred resource defined at BV7 and Delta as well as providing initial testing for new discoveries within the broader Crush Creek project area.

This is aimed at upgrading and expanding existing mineral resources at Crush Creek to build critical mass for high-grade new gold developments as potential satellite mill feed to the nearby Mt Carlton Operation.

Results to date have validated this belief with drilling at BV7 appearing to confirm continuity of the high-grade lode system between current drilling levels and surface outcrops.

It has also highlighted potential zones of extension of the prospective geology and alteration both below and to the north of the current lode system which will require further drilling.

Over at Delta, drilling has confirmed a continuous high-grade core of gold mineralisation across multiple holes while providing greater definition of the geology and grade zonation patterns around the high-grade gold core.

Drilling at Crush Creek has now paused for the wet season and is expected to resume in March 2022.

Planned RC and diamond drilling will test multiple shallow extensional and discovery targets within the Crush Creek tenements with the aim of extending the envelope of known mineralisation

This article was developed in collaboration with Navarre Minerals, 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.