E79 Gold Mines completes first milestone of Pinjin gold joint venture with St Barbara
Previous owner St Barbara evaluated a number of targets across the Pinjin tenements.
Perth-based explorer E79 Gold Mines (ASX: E79) has completed the first milestone of a joint venture earn-in deal with St Barbara (ASX: SBM) over the Pinjin gold project in Western Australia’s world-class Laverton district.
The milestone required E79 to spend at least $310,000 on exploration over a 12 month period to earn a 51% stake in the joint venture.
E79 is now moving towards completion of the agreement’s second milestone which involves a further $500,000 exploration spend over 24 months for an additional 29% stake.
If both conditions are met, E79 will assume total equity of 80% in Pinjin.
The Pinjin joint venture contains a number of prospects, including walk-up drill targets, which have been evaluated and ranked by St Barbara.
Aircore drilling of 281 holes for 15,103m has been completed on three target areas since November.
Assays are due before May.
ASX debut
E79 made its debut on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) in October last year following a $7 million initial public offering.
The company immediately commenced work on its flagship projects at Laverton South and Jungar Flats in the North Murchison region.
E79 chief executive officer Ned Summerhayes was pleased to have achieved the initial earn-in milestone for Pinjin so quickly since listing.
“We have drilled over 280 aircore holes and completed several geophysical surveys since listing to build on the work that St Barbara has done over the years,” he said.
“We look forward to continuing our relationship with St Barbara as we move towards completion of the next stage of this earn-in.”
Jungar Flats survey
E79 recently completed a ground gravity survey over the bulk of the tenement package at the Jungar Flat project, 70 kilometres west of Meekatharra and 45km north-northeast of the 2.8 million ounce Big Bell gold deposit owned by Westgold Resources (ASX: WGX).
The survey will allow for inference of contacts between granite, greenstone sequences and broad structural trends under cover.
Mr Summerhayes said the central greenstone belt – which is obscured by granite through the central zone of the tenements – was of particular interest to the company.
Jungar Flats covers an area of 336sq km and contains approximately 30km of strike along the highly-prospective Big Bell Shear.
The ground survey is currently undergoing processing and interpretation ahead of planned exploration activities.
Gold producing location
Laverton South covers the southern portion of the Laverton Tectonic Zone (LTZ) which sits within the major gold producing Archean Yilgarn Craton.
The LTZ is one of the world’s richest gold belts with more than 30Moz in past production, reserves and resources.
It hosts numerous significant deposits including Granny Smith (totalling 3.7Moz), Sunrise Dam (10.3Moz) and Wallaby (11.8Moz).
Laverton South comprises tenement packages at Lake Yindana and the Pinjin joint venture, which sit 15km either side of the 1Moz Rebecca deposit owned by Ramelius Resources (ASX: RMS).
The Pinjin ground straddles the Anglo-Saxon deposits owned by Hawthorn Resources (ASX: HAW) and is located 7.5km south of the historic Patricia shallow open pits.