Special Report: Not often do you get to explore historic gold producing areas with new techniques — but that’s what Great Southern is up to in Queensland 

Now suitably funded to advance its Projects , Great Southern Mining (ASX:GSN) is looking to embark on an exploration program starting in the third quarter to firm up targets at Edinburgh Park.

For those of you playing at home, the Edinburgh Park Project is a package of tenements with a boundary that extends from 25km away to within just 5km from the Mt Carlton gold-silver-copper project — which co-incidentally was discovered by Conquest Mining (now Evolution Mining) when current Great Southern chairman John Terpu was there as Managing Director.

So, he clearly knows his stuff about the area.

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Mt Carlton, one of the highest-grade open pit gold mines in the world, will produce up to 105,000oz in FY19 at an all-in sustaining cost of between $670 and $720 per ounce.

In February, the company hit what it thinks may be the start of a massive Mt Carlton-esque gold-silver-copper system.

Hits included significant zones of gold up to 0.2g/t, silver up to 49.7g/t and copper up to 0.44 per cent.

Meanwhile, polymetallic rock chip samples from other nearby outcrops confirmed the potential for the area — coming back with grades of up to 10.6 g/t Au, 315g/t Ag, and copper up to 1.95 percent.

It was basically just a reconnaissance program, but Great Southern is hoping the new exploration will provide it even more drill targets in the area.

New exploration

While Great Southern’s project is more than 1000km2, less than 15 per cent of the total area has been explored with modern techniques.

The company will be undertaking:

  • High resolution airborne magnetic and radiometric surveys
  • Regional geological mapping and geochemistry programs
  • Remotely sensed alteration mapping

The aim for the program, which kicks off in Q3, is to provide regional geological context and delineate multiple prospects for follow-up drill targeting to get the market excited.

Internally, the company is excited by the early work — mostly because of the striking similarities between early drilling here and early drilling at Mt Carlton which provides one of the exploration analogues for the area.

It told the market earlier this week that the early results from Rocky Ponds (one of the prospects driving excitement for Great Southern) drilling had similarities Mt Carlton’s A39 deposit (2.7Mt @ 178g/t Ag and 0.12 per cent Cu) and the V2 deposit (9.02Mt @ 1.7 Au, 19g/t Ag, and 0.24 per cent Cu).

It’s also tipping its Edinburgh Park deposits to be ‘deep and large’, based on the size of the hydrothermal systems observed and it has the geological models to prove it.

It says Rocky Ponds is essentially a ‘breccia pipe’, which is a certain kind of geological formation often with considerable vertical extent.

Knowing that, it was able to find other rocks which were also breccia pipes.

On the left are three regional mineralised gold-bearing breccia pipes, and on the right is the extent of Great Southern’s drilling at Rocky Ponds, barely scratching the surface.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to work out that Great Southern is pretty excited by the possibility of going deeper at Rocky Ponds.

And it all starts in Q3 with an exploration sweep.

This story was developed in collaboration with Great Southern Mining Limited, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.
This story does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.

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