Middle Island Resources uncovers significant gold at Two Mile Hill
Middle Island expects an updated formal Mineral Resource will be completed in the December quarter.
Gold explorer Middle Island Resources (ASX: MDI) has returned significant gold results from a recent infill resource definition drilling campaign at its Two Mile Hill deposit in Western Australia’s mid-west.
The company today reported that all assays had been received from the diamond drilling program, with significant intersections from the tonalite (granite) including 165m grading at 1.11 grams per tonne of gold from a depth of 85m, including 7m at 4.73g/t gold from 123m, 5m at 6g/t gold from 142m, and 10m at 3.34g/t gold from 202m.
Other highlights included 150m at 1.03g/t gold from 84m depth, including 34m at 1.85g/t gold from 96m.
A new zone of high-grade mineralisation was identified within a banded iron formation, returning a 5m intersection grading at 21.9g/t gold from 339m, including 2m at 54g/t gold from 340m.
In addition, shallow gold intercepts were returned within basalts along the north-eastern tonalite contact, including 93m at 2.57g/t gold from surface.
Resource modelling
Two Mile Hill deposit is a tonalite deeps deposit that lies within Middle Island’s wholly-owned Sandstone project, located between the WA mining towns of Mt Magnet and Leinster in the East Murchison field.
The deposit is situated 4km north of Middle Island’s 600,000-tonne-per-annum Sandstone gold processing plant via an existing haul road and has an exploration target of 24-34 million tonnes at 1.1-1.4 g/t gold for 0.9-1.5 million ounces of gold.
The recent stage one infill diamond drilling program, which drilled into the upper half of the deposit, was completed in July.
Due to the significant drilling results, Middle Island said the resource model for the upper half of the Two Mile Hill deposit will now be re-estimated. This updated resource estimate is anticipated for completion in the late September.
An updated formal Mineral Resource is also expected to be completed in the December quarter.
“Utilising these results, resource modelling of the exploration target will provide a formal Mineral Resource [for] the upper half of the Two Mile Hill tonalite deeps exploration target, provide better resolution on the distribution of gold mineralisation within the tonalite which, together with the recently completed ore sorting campaign and geotechnical findings, will facilitate a more robust assessment of the underground mining potential,” Middle Island managing director Rick Yeates said.
Shares in the company surged almost 36% to A$0.019 following the news. By afternoon trade, Middle Island stock was sitting 21.43% up at A$0.017.