Surefire fires starting gun on WA gold drilling
Surefire Resources has kicked off a new, two-phase drilling campaign, starting at its 100 per cent owned Yidby gold prospect in Western Australia’s mid-west region, followed by a maiden drill program at the company’s nearby Phat Boy copper project.
The 2500m, 12-hole reverse circulation program will test nine newly identified targets recently revealed by independent consultants commissioned by the company to review old geophysical data, along with structural interpretations from available diamond-core and drill-chip relogging.
Sitting 350km north of Perth and just 30km north of Capricorn Metal’s 3.24-million-ounce Mt Gibson mine, Yidby has emerged as a significant gold prospect with mineralised zones up to 80m wide in places.
Lying to the south and east of the known gold zone at Yidby, the new targets include one significant conductive induced polarisation (IP) anomaly and additional gravity anomalies which look similar to others that have previously lined up with high-grade intersections.
Once completed, the focus of attention will turn to the company’s Phat Boy copper project, immediately adjacent to Yidby where an 11-hole, 2200m maiden drill program will assess the potential for volcanogenic hosted massive sulphide (VHMS) copper-zinc mineralisation.
Phat Boy sits just 50km south and along strike from 29Metals’ renowned Golden Grove multi-commodity VHMS project that primarily hosts copper-lead-zinc-gold-silver mineralisation containing about 15.1 million tonnes of ore reserves.
A recently completed follow-up geochemical survey highlighted four coincident anomalous zones which will now be the specific subject of the drill campaign.
The anomalies sit along the edge of an inferred shear zone which runs for nearly 3km and lies next to an outcropping folded banded-iron formation (BIF) in the southern portion of the lease. Previous drilling there picked up native copper and sulphides.
Elsewhere, Surefire is progressing its massive Victory Bore project, also in Western Australia’s Mid West. Containing a significant mineral resource of 464 million tonnes at 0.3 per cent vanadium oxide, 5.12 per cent titanium oxide and 17.7 per cent magnetite iron, the deposit hosts a reserve of 93 million tonnes of contained metals.
The company eventually aims to produce 1.25 million tonnes of vanadium-titanium magnetite concentrate annually, with plans to convert the upgraded ore into a range of high-demand products.
Surefire recently signed memorandums of understanding (MoUs) with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Investment and two private Saudi companies to assist with the development of its project.
The MOU’s will be used as a pathway to a joint venture that will look to support the project financially and later develop a mineral processing facility in Saudi Arabia to process magnetite concentrate from the project.
With a rampant gold price, currently sitting around AU$4050 an ounce and a resilient copper price trading just below US$10,000 (AU$15,100) a tonne driven by declining supply and increased demand from clean energy technology, the timing of Surefire’s drilling program could not be better.
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