NickelX receives $180,000 grant for drilling at Biranup gold targets
NickelX has encountered sulphide mineralisation during diamond drilling at its Fire Dragon and Silver Dragon prospects.
Junior explorer NickelX (ASX: NKL) has received a $180,000 grant under the WA Government’s exploration incentive scheme (EIS) to support a drilling campaign at its wholly-owned Biranup gold project in the world-class Albany Fraser Orogen.
Diamond drilling will focus on the Black Dragon and Red Dragon targets, located near to the tier one Tropicana operation (owned by AngloGold Ashanti, ASX: AGG) and the emerging Hercules gold discovery (Carawine Resources, ASX: CWX).
Hercules is spatially coincident with the Black Dragon shear zone, as well as a 250 kilometre-long structural feature in gravity data which also passes through Tropicana.
The planned holes at Black Dragon will test a coincident induced polarisation (IP) resistivity and surface geochemical anomaly over an area which has never before been subject to diamond drilling.
Holes at Red Dragon will test the down-dip extension of a known gold mineralised shear zone which dips to the southeast, where historical drilling is reported to have stopped too short to intersect significant mineralisation.
Sub-cropping basement
Black Dragon is marked by an area of sub-cropping basement surrounded by colluvium and wind-blown sand.
Gold mineralisation is associated with quartz veining, hematite breccia, iron-rich sheared basement schist and gneiss and sericite-altered granite with disseminated pyrite.
Individual veins are up to 5m wide and can be traced at surface for up to 30m along strike.
Multiple mineralised veins with unknown dips have been previously recorded at Black Dragon.
NickelX said limited historical drilling had failed to explain a surface gold-silver-tellurium anomalism or provide information about the mineralisation’s orientation, structural controls, genesis or source.
Compelling targets
NickelX managing director Matt Gauci believes Black Dragon and Red Dragon represent compelling targets for the company’s continued exploration at Biranup.
“Our ongoing review of Biranup has identified very underexplored but high-priority gold targets which will be explored with the EIS grant,” he said
“We are now organising an IP survey, as well as aircore, reverse circulation and diamond drilling which will follow current exploration activities at the Cosmos South and Dalwallinu projects.”