QMines intersects high-grade mineralisation outside known resource at Mt Chalmers copper-gold project
QMines executive chairman Andrew Sparke says the company plans to unveil a resource update shortly.
Exploration company QMines (ASX: QML) has reported multiple, wide and high-grade copper-gold-zinc intersections from drilling outside of the known resource at the historic Mt Chalmers copper-gold project in Queensland.
Results comprised peak grades of 41.51 grams per tonne gold 11.65% copper, 224g/t silver, 6.18% lead and 33.9% zinc.
All intervals occurred within broader mineralised intersections.
The company completed a total of 35 holes for 3,498m, which comprised 14 diamond holes for 1,587m, seven reverse circulation holes for 602m and 14 reverse circulation pre-collars for 1,309m.
The program was designed to expand the historic project’s resource model with a series of step-out holes drilled on the western, southern and eastern sides of the pits outside of the current resource wireframes, and multiple pre-collars drilled ready to complete diamond tails.
Untested areas
Several holes were drilled in previously untested areas on the western side of the main pit and to the north of the west load with a view to unveiling mineral potential which may have been missed by previous explorers.
Significant intersections were 60.8m at 2.59g/t gold, 0.74% copper, 11.1g/t silver, 1.81% zinc and 0.71% lead from 6.2m, including 12.6m at 12.01g/t gold, 0.79% copper, 43.0g/t silver, 8.42% zinc and 3.25% lead from 21.2m; and 38.5m at 1.22g/t gold, 0.76% copper and 2.3g/t silver from 63m, including 10.5m at 1.30g/t gold, 1.93% copper and 5.2g/t silver from 91m.
Also returned was 16m at 0.57g/t gold and 2.18% copper from 104m, including 7.2m at 1.11g/t gold, 4.15% copper and 2g/t silver from 111.6m; and 7m at 2.90g/t gold, 0.1% copper, 119g/t silver, 13.69% zinc and 3.29% lead from 107m.
Resource growth potential
Executive chairman Andrew Sparke said the results confirm significant resource growth potential at Mount Chalmers and precede a planned resource upgrade later this year.
“The results from our current drilling program are very exciting [and] demonstrate that this deposit has strong grade and width and is growing rapidly,” he said.
“We continue to intersect new mineralisation outside the current resource [and] remains open in all directions which gives us confidence that this deposit will continue to grow.”