Impact Minerals’ latest results from Rockwell show good palladium-platinum-gold grades
Impact Minerals managing director Dr Mike Jones said Little Broken Hill Gabbro was “starting to light up like a Christmas tree”.
Less than a week after reporting that its Rockwell prospect in NSW had a large mineral inventory, Impact Minerals (ASX: IPT) has now released latest assays showing good grades of 3PGE (palladium-platinum-gold).
Rockwell is part of the company’s Little Broken Hill Gabbro (LBHG) project 25 km south of Broken Hill.
News from the first ever drill program at Rockwell out last week said reconnaissance drill holes and survey data show a strongly anomalous zone over at least 1.5km.
Impact has said that its work has shown LBHG to be of a similar size, age, chemical composition and in the same geodynamic setting as the giant Jinchuan nickel-copper-PGE deposit in China which comprises 500 million tonnes at 1.1% nickel, 0.7% copper and 0.5% platinum group elements.
Nickel and copper also present
Apart from the 3PGE, five drill holes have also returned nickel and copper over at least 400m of strike.
“The ultramafic unit contains robust widths up to 60m thick of strongly anomalous 3PGE mineralisation,” the company said.
“Mineralisation is increasing in thickness and grade at depth and to the south but is still open in all directions.”
Key drill results included 61m at 0.4 grams per tonne 3PGE from 31m down hole, with three higher grade sections contained in that intercept.
Another hole returned 23m at 0.2g/t 3PGE, while a third assayed 56m at 0.2g/t 3PGE from 63m.
Then another hole came back from the laboratory totalling 40m at 0.2 3PGE and 0.2% copper.
Deposit lighting up like a Christmas tree
Impact noted that these results from the first drill program at LBHG are “extremely encouraging for the discovery of a significant deposit given the remainder of the entire 6.5km extent of the target is so far untested”.
Managing director Dr Mike Jones said the new assays demonstrate that the basal ultramafic units of the LBHG contains thick widths of modest grades of PGE, nickel and copper, with higher grades in many places over a significant strike extent.
“The LBHG is basically starting to light up like a Christmas tree,” said Dr Jones.
The company has also acknowledged a $75,000 grant by the Geological Survey of New South Wales toward the drilling program.