Mining

Venus Metals and Rox Resources report significant gold results from Youanmi drilling

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By Imelda Cotton - 
Venus Metals Sovereign prospect gold Rox Resources ASX VMC RXL

Drilling at Sovereign has extended gold mineralisation down dip with a best intercept of 8m at 5.03g/t gold.

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Venus Metals Corporation (ASX: VMC) and joint venture partner Rox Resources (ASX: RXL) have reported significant results from aircore drilling at the regional tenements of the historic Youanmi gold project in Western Australia.

A program of 426 holes for 22,455m intersected regolith gold anomalism associated with interpreted north-west trending structures over approximately 4km of strike.

Drilling was focused on the identification of orogenic gold mineralisation over priority target areas across the tenements and was designed to test demagnetised zones and helicopter-borne time-domain electromagnetic (TDEM) conductors over an 18km strike continuation of the Youanmi Shear Zone.

The zone is a major crustal-scale structure and is believed to be the first-order fluid pathway for gold mineralisation in the region.

Main gold occurrences are related to subsidiary faults and are renowned for high grades.

In-situ regolith

The aircore program penetrated beyond the depths of historical rotary airblast drilling to test the in-situ regolith beneath transported cover sequences.

Drilling occurred over four target areas to average hole depths which were deeper than expected and intersected mainly mafic schist, clastic sediments and felsic volcanoclastic rocks.

Paleochannel sediments were encountered in the northern part of the program.

Most of the drill lines hit regolith gold anomalism grading more than 100 parts per billion (or 0.1 gram per tonne) and many of the anomalous holes ended in mineralisation, indicating a primary source of mineralisation at depth.

Significant intercepts

The program focused on an area of 18km strike continuation between the Penny project (owned by Ramelius Resources, ASX: RMS) and the historic Youanmi mine.

Significant intercepts were 16m at 0.91g/t gold from 56m, including 4m at 2.37g/t from 68m; 12m at 0.68g/t gold from 48m, including 4m at 1.29g/t from 48m; 16m at 0.28g/t gold from 44m; 4m at 0.86g/t gold from 24m; and 4m at 0.85g/t gold from 20m.

Other results were 5m at 0.58g/t gold from 52m; 4m at 0.53g/t gold from 48m; 16m at 0.13g/t gold from 36m; 3m at 0.67g/t gold from 40m; 3m at 0.62g/t gold from 24m; and 8m at 0.2g/t gold from 32m.

First insight

Rox managing director Alex Passmore said the results provided the first insight into gold potential beneath the transported cover which persists through much of the belt.

“We have recognised the broader Youanmi belt has a history of high-grade discoveries in differing geological settings however it remains substantially underexplored,” he said.

“We are extremely pleased to have identified some significant mineralised corridors and zones of gold anomalism beneath the widespread transported cover.”

He said next steps would include follow-up infill and extensional aircore drilling to further define the geometry and extent of oxide mineralisation as well as regional target generation along strike of the Youanmi Shear Zone.