Special Report: One of this year’s most eagerly anticipated mineral exploration programmes has just kicked off in Western Australia’s Paterson Province.

Antipa Minerals (ASX:AZY) informed the market this morning that it had commenced a 20,000 metre drilling campaign on its 100 per cent-owned tenements in the Paterson, which lie in close proximity to Rio Tinto’s Winu copper discovery and Greatland Gold’s Havieron deposit.

News from Winu and Havieron over the past 12 months has ignited investor interest in the Paterson and sparked a rush by other explorers to peg ground in the area.

Antipa began building its position in the Paterson in 2011 when it was a less than fashionable address and has accumulated more than 5,500km2of what it believes is prime exploration ground, including a 1,335km2portion known as the Citadel Project that Rio Tinto is farming into by spending up to $60M to earn a 75% interest.

What sets the Antipa landholding apart is the relatively shallow cover.

Whereas the rocks of interest in other parts of the Paterson can sit below kilometres of desert sand and other worthless material, the majority of the rocks of interest on Antipa’s ground are under less than 40m of cover.

This makes for more economic exploration and, in the event of a discovery, improves the chances of it stacking up as a viable development.

Antipa will test 26 greenfields targets on its 100 per cent owned tenements as part of the current drilling campaign. (Supplied)

World-class discovery the aim

As part of the drilling programme that has just begun, Antipa will test up to 30+ greenfields targets identified through both aerial electromagnetic (AEM) surveys and aeromagnetic surveys.

AEM has been applied with great success in the Paterson and has led to most of the recent discoveries including Winu, whilst Havieron was originally discovered in 1992 using aeromagnetics.

“The new breed of targets, concealed beneath shallow cover, was generated during our 2018 expanded greenfields exploration programme via state-of-the-art survey techniques,” Antipa managing director Roger Mason said.

“The 2018 AEM and aeromagnetic targets will be systematically evaluated this year with the aim of making a world-class discovery.”

Antipa will also assess the brownfields gold prospect, Turkey Farm, near the Company’s established gold and copper resources at Minyari-WACA and Newcrest Mining’s Telfer gold-copper operation, as part of the drilling campaign.

In this morning’s announcement, Antipa also revealed it had identified two additional AEM targets less than 8km along strike from the Winu discovery on its 100 per cent-owned ground.

These targets will also be tested during the current campaign.

Helicopter flying aerial electromagnetic (AEM) survey over Antipa’s ground in the Paterson Province. (Supplied)

Placement takes care of funding

Antipa completed a share placement raising $5.1 million in April, with the proceeds to fund the 2019 exploration programme.

The placement was undertaken at $0.019 a share and was strongly supported by existing shareholders and a number of new, high quality domestic and international investors.

Antipa’s share price closed at $0.019 on Friday.

This story was developed in collaboration with Antipa Minerals, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.
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