Historic WA Sandstone field produces more encouraging gold hits for Alto Metals
A highlight intercept from latest drilling at Alto Metals’ Sandstone gold project was 15m at 3.1g/t gold from 198m, including 6m at 5.3g/t gold from 205m.
Drilling below the old Lord Nelson open pit has produced more “high-grade” gold for Alto Metals (ASX: AME) as well as extending the gold zone and confirming the continuity of mineralisation.
The results from what is now the Lords Corridor shows also that the mineralisation remains open.
Additionally, assays from reverse circulation and diamond drilling at the Lord Nelson and Lord Henry deposits, hosted in the Lords structure have come back with wide intersections.
Project area contains ‘numerous’ old pits, prospects
The Lords Corridor is more than 3km long and lies within the wider Sandstone gold project.
These latest results include 15m at 3.1 grams per tonne gold (including 6m at 5.3g/t), 10m at 2.1g/t (including 1m at 14.8g/t), 21m at 1.4g/t (including 0.5m at 27.4g/t), and 6m at 2.2g/t (including 1m at 8.1g/t).
Alto’s ground contains numerous former open pits, prospects and gold occurrences, including Lord Nelson and Lord Henry, Havilah and Maninga Marley, Ladybird, Indomitable, Tiger Moth, Vanguard and Vanguard North, Oroya & Hacks, Bull Oak, Sandstone North, and Bulchina.
The company’s 900sq km project is on the Sandstone greenstone belt, where gold was discovered at the end of the 19th century.
The belt has produced more than 1.3 million ounces of gold from numerous underground and open pit mining operations.
Of this, some 612,000oz was produced between 1994 and 2008 from the open-pit mining of shallow oxide ore by the former Herald Resources and Troy Resources (ASX: TRY).
Alto managing director Matthew Bowles says the next phase of drilling will test the extensions of mineralisation at depth and repeat lodes along the Lords Corridor.
‘Potentially on to a larger gold system’
“The latest results from the Lords Corridor continue to demonstrate the continuity of significant, high-grade gold mineralisation, which is exciting as it indicates we are potentially on to a larger gold system,” he added.
The Lord Nelson and Lord Henry open pits are hosted at the northern and southern end of a large granodiorite intrusion, which is more than 3km long and up to 600m wide. It also has had limited drilling below 100m.
The company says that, between 1994 and 2009, the exploration focus at Sandstone was largely on shallow oxide ore to feed the 1987 vintage Herald/Troy Nunngarra mill, at a time when the Australian dollar gold price was substantially lower than it is today.
“With a higher gold price, an excellent database and a better understanding of regolith and the structural control on large gold deposits, Alto is confident of achieving its goal of 1-5 million ounces of gold,” the company has stated previously.