New gold targets tease scale of Indiana’s Central Gawler project

Indiana has cast its eyes on several intriguing new gold targets at its Central Gawler project in South Australia that have seen little to no historical drilling.

The new gold-in-calcrete anomalies were identified along the fertile Lake Labyrinth Shear Zone (LLSZ), including a large 6.5km x 800m coherent gold-in-calcrete anomaly at the Ealbara Prospect.

Successful drilling at the Minos prospect, which returned results like 38m grading 6.54 grams per tonne (g/t) gold from 124m and 21m at 8.43g/t gold from 75m, had reinforced Indiana Resources’ (ASX:IDA) belief that the LLSZ is a significant gold bearing system.

The company plans to carry out further sampling and drilling programs to test these geochemical anomalies once statutory and heritage approvals are granted.

“We are highly encouraged by the coherent gold anomalism identified along the Lake Labyrinth Shear Zone at Ealbara and Partridge, with the shear hosting our broad, high-grade gold mineralisation at Minos,” technical director Felicity Repacholi-Muir said.

“The strong gold anomaly returned at Earea Dam is of particular interest, and further highlights the underlying potential over this region.

“Our exploration team is reviewing the geochemical anomalism and is now planning the next stage of exploration to test for mineralisation in the bedrock.”

New targets

The company has previously carried out calcrete sampling in December 2021 at various locations across the Central Gawler gold project to identify additional drill targets along the prospective structures.

Auger sampling targeting calcareous soils (calcrete) has been successfully employed as one of the preferred geochemical sampling mediums for gold exploration within the Gawler Craton and has been credited with several significant gold discoveries over the past three decades.

Notable examples include the Challenger gold mine and Marmota’s (ASX:MEU) recent success at Aurora Tank.

Of the anomalies identified by the company, Ealbara lies along the LLSZ near a major inflection zone where limited previous calcrete sampling defined a discrete gold-in-calcrete anomaly.

Indiana’s sampling has now outlined a high-order 6.5km by 800m anomaly that coincides with a north-northeast trend clearly visible in magnetic imagery.

In a similar vein

Meanwhile, at the Partridge prospect – located 8km northwest of Minos along the LLSZ – field reconnaissance has noted quartz float similar to that observed at Minos while the sampling outlined a 1,200m by 400m gold-in-calcrete anomaly with good strike continuity.

Detailed mapping and infill auger lines will be undertaken at the targets to better constrain the large anomaly boundaries prior to planning drill activities.

Earea Dam consists of two areas surrounding the historical Earea Dam gold mine that produced about 2,000oz of gold at an average grade of about 35 grams per tonne gold between 1899 and the 1940s.

This has been defined over a 300m by 200m north-south area and the company will carry out detailed mapping to better constrain the anomaly boundaries prior to planning drill activities.

This article was developed in collaboration with Indiana Resources, 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.