Meteoric Resources confirms visible gold in thick zones at Palm Springs project
Meteoric Resources will now focus on Palm Springs and Juruena while retaining exposure to Rafaella’s portfolio as a substantial shareholder.
A follow-up drilling program by Meteoric Resources (ASX: MEI) at the Palm Springs gold project in Western Australia’s Kimberley region has confirmed the presence of visible gold in thick and robust zones of mineralisation, south of the project’s JORC mineral resource area.
The company said its strategy of targeting anticlinal hinge zones resulted in immediate success with visible gold observed at three intervals at one of the drillholes within a 79-metre intersection of strongly veined and altered gold-hosting syenite.
The gold was identified at 268.5m, 302.8m, and 318.3m depth, with grains up to a maximum of 3 millimetres in diameter observed in 50mm thick veins of blocky quartz with carbonate and chlorite.
Another hole intercepted a similar hinge zone with strong alteration of the target syenite at the anticlinal closure and over 80m of syenite intersected.
Two other holes located south of the 2020 mineral resource estimate intersected thick downhole intervals of host syenite.
The intervals sit 80m south of Meteoric’s historic Butchers Creek resource of 5.2 million tonnes at 1.9g/t gold for 319,000 ounces, and confirm the orebody extends and remains open to the southwest.
New knowledge
Meteoric managing director Dr Andrew Tunks said drilling to date has given the company new knowledge on the Palm Springs mineralisation.
“We learnt a great deal about Palm Springs from last year’s maiden program [and this year’s drilling] is designed to improve our confidence in the spatial distribution of the high-grade zone and further extend this zone down plunge to potentially grow the current gold resource inventory,” he said.
“The presence of visual gold in [one of the holes] confirms the presence of the high-grade core within the anticline and it is gratifying to get immediate validation in the drilling results.”
Additional holes
Three additional diamond holes will be completed next month targeting untested anticlinal hinges identified by JORC drilling in 2020, which returned a result of 69m at 4.38g/t gold.
“[We already know] that the altered syenite observed in some holes confirms that the mineralisation extends and remains open south of the current resource at Butchers Creek,” Dr Tunks said.
“Excitingly, we believe there are more intersections into the anticlinal hinge zone to come from the balance of the diamond tails.”