Heavy Minerals hits high-grade zones during maiden drilling at Port Gregory garnet project
Heavy Minerals executive director and chief executive officer Nic Matich said the broad mineralised intersections were a “spectacular start” to exploration at its Port Gregory project and strengthen confidence in the exploration target.
Maiden drilling at Heavy Minerals’ (ASX: HVY) Port Gregory garnet project in Western Australia has intersected broad high-grade zones of heavy minerals sands from surface in all holes drilled.
The aircore program comprised 19 holes for a total 626m to identify the zones, which are believed to be consistent with those returned from historical drilling by GMA Garnet Group and further strengthen the company’s current exploration target.
Notable intersections at a 1% THM (total heavy minerals) cut-off grade were 4% HM (heavy minerals) over 31.5m from surface; 2.9% HM over 37.5m from surface; 4.5% HM over 11.9m from surface; and 3% HM over 18m from surface.
Higher grade intercepts were found at shallow depths and are analogous to similar deposits in the region which boast simple and low-cost dozer-based mining operations.
Port Gregory’s mineralisation is open at depth, with a sand unit containing elevated grades located above the Tamala Limestone basement.
Positive results
Executive director and chief executive officer Nic Matich was pleased with the positive maiden results.
“These broad intersections are a spectacular start to our [exploration] program … coupled with the correlation to historical results, our confidence in the exploration target is being further strengthened,” he said.
“This is the culmination of a significant volume of hard work by our team and the financial support of our shareholders.”
Auger sampling
Auger sampling is now being conducted on several Port Gregory targets identified through historical results and on-site analysis.
Heavy Minerals is working with landowners across its extensive tenure holding to ensure a pipeline of targets for follow-up deeper aircore drilling to potentially delineate additional resources.
Exploration target
Port Gregory is a 181 square kilometre tenement package containing an identified exploration target between 170 million tonnes and 250Mt grading between 3.8% and 4.6% THM and 46% garnet.
The contained garnet target totals approximately 4Mt.
The project is located in the Hutt River mineralogical terrain within the shire of Northampton and borders GMA’s active Port Gregory garnet mine.