Sunshine Metals says the transition of the footwall zone mineralisation from gold-rich to more copper-rich at depth is consistent with the known Carrington mineralisation. Pic via Getty Images
Mining
Special Report: Drilling has extended the gold-copper rich footwall at Sunshine Metals’ Liontown prospect near Charter Towers in North Queensland after returning high-grade assays of up to 20m @ 18.21g/t gold from 114m.
The top result in the latest batch of assays is 45m downdip from – and pretty consistent – with the 17m @ 22.14g/t intersection reported last November from drilling that targeted the gold-copper rich footwall and feeder zones to the Liontown polymetallic resource of 4.9Mt @ 12% zinc equivalent.
Liontown is part of the broader Ravenswood Consolidated project.
Notably for Sunshine Metals (ASX:SHN), the drill program validated its ‘Main Feeder’ zone concept – a gold-focused geological model that has already identified three potential feeder fault zones.
These include the Main Feeder within the 2.3Mt zinc-gold-copper-lead-silver VMS resource, the Carrington Feeder adjacent to the historical Carrington Main Shaft and the Gap Zone Feeder in the under-drilled Gap Zone.
On the back of this success, SHN launched a six-hole drill program earlier this year totalling 1,148m to test the recently identified gold-rich pumice breccia zone which delivered the earlier top intersection and a gold-copper rich zone to the west.
Results from this drill program have now extended the high-grade pumice breccia zone to over 260m by 140m. It remains open downdip.
Besides the top intersection, which includes an even higher grade zone of 10m @ 34.79g/t gold from a down-hole depth of 115m, drilling at the pumice breccia zone also returned intersections of 3m @ 6.81g/t gold and 1% copper from 186m and 2m @ 2.79g/t gold from 157m.
SHN notes the ~1.6km long gold-rich pumice breccia horizon aligns with historical Carrington mine to the west and east through the Gap Zone to the Liontown East footwall.
Meanwhile, hole 24LTRC003, which tested the gold-copper rich zone, returned a 4m intersection @ 2.11g/t gold, 2.73% copper and 4.04% zinc from 70m.“These exceptional results reinforce our belief that the gold-rich footwall at Liontown has the potential to be a significant standalone gold and copper system,” SHN managing director Dr Damien Keys said
“Furthermore, the footwall zone appears to grade from gold-rich mineralisation, into more copper-rich mineralisation at depth. This is an observation consistent with those documented from miners at Carrington in the early 1900s.
“Significantly, the 20m @ 18.21g/t gold intersection is 45m below the 17m @ 22.1g/t gold, eliminating enrichment due to supergene processes. In addition, the intersection contained visible gold in RC chips, indicating high recovery potential from conventional gravity separation.
“We only took control at Liontown in September 2023 and with every drill hole we are substantially building on our understanding of the gold-copper potential at Liontown.”
SHN has started drilling targeting high-grade, footwall extensions of the pumice breccia horizon east of the Main Feeder Zone and into the ~400m long Gap Zone, including around the Gap Zone Feeder.
Results are also pending from a 2km induced polarisation survey that will feed into the next phase of drilling.
Dr Keys says metallurgical studies incorporating petrology and gravity separation will begin in the June 2024 quarter.
This article was developed in collaboration with Sunshine Metals, 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.
Get the latest Stockhead news delivered free to your inbox.
