Cobalt Blue’s drilling campaign extends cobalt mineralisation at Thackaringa project

Cobalt Blue (ASX: COB) has received initial assays from drilling at its Thackaringa cobalt project in New South Wales, which have revealed cobalt mineralisation continues along strike at down dip of the Railway deposit.

Better results from the first 18 reverse circulation holes include 72m grading 1,115 parts per million cobalt (0.11%), 10.1% sulphur and 9.8% iron, 25m grading 1,204ppm (0.12%) cobalt, 9.5% sulphur and 10.6% iron, and 40m grading 1,096ppm (0.10%) cobalt, 10.4% sulphur and 10% iron.

The current drilling program comprises 75 holes including 59 RC and 16 diamond drill holes for 13,000m across three main targets within the project area including 49 holes at the Railway deposit.

According to Cobalt Blue, the program is 70% complete and due to wind up by the end of the month.

Once all the program is complete and all assays have been returned, Cobalt Blue plans to release an upgraded resource by 1 April 2018.

“The work continues to add substantially to our geological understanding of Thackaringa, with its significant combined strike length of 4.5km and widths varying from 25m to 100m,” Cobalt Blue chairman Rob Biancardi said.

The drilling program is run concurrently with the project’s pre-feasibility study, which is investigating producing a battery-ready cobalt product using calcine and leach processing steps.

Cobalt Blue anticipates the feasibility study will be delivered by mid-2018, with a bankable feasibility study and project approvals planned for mid-2019, followed by a decision to mine and acquiring requisite development finance.

Based in New South Wales, the Thackaringa project encompasses 63 square kilometres and is 23km from Broken Hill which has a long mining history, experienced workforce and a population of about 18,517. The project also has access to road, water, power and is 400km by rail from Port Pirie.

In late November, Cobalt Blue completed a A$2.5 million capital raising to fund a larger pre-feasibility program and provide technical improvements to potentially enhance commercial production at the project.

Cobalt Blue’s shares sky rocketed more than 42% in late afternoon trade to close the day at A$0.60.