Attila Resources (ASX: AYA) is acquiring additional coal leases at the Seymour Property about 3.5 kilometres south of its existing Kodiak Coking Coal Project – Gurnee Property in Alabama
The Gurnee Property hosts an Inferred Resource of 81 million tonnes in the Atkins and Coke coal seams, both of which outcrop on the Seymour Property.
Attila has the option to secure mining rights to up to four coal seams that are found throughout the Seymour Property.
The uppermost of these, the Upper Thompson, underlies the central and eastern portion of the property, with the next lowest, the Coke and Atkins seams, underlying the major portion of the property. The stratigraphically lowest seam, the Big Bone, underlies the entire property.
All beds dip to the southeast into the Daily Basin, a sub-unit of the larger Cahaba Basin within which the property lies.
With the exception of Big Bone, all these beds have been surface mined along the majority of their outcrop with the resultant highwalls providing sites for the development of low cost underground mines.
The area is also covered by 75 coal seam gas wells and nine diamond core holes along with data from historic prospecting and sampling along the seams’ outcrops.
However, further diamond drilling will have to be undertaken in order to estimate a JORC resource.
The Atkins, Coke and Upper Thompson coal seams typically range in thickness between 0.75 metres to 2.1 metres on the Seymour Property, with averages in the range of 1.0 metres to 1.6 metres; these are slightly thicker than the same seams on the Gurnee Property.
Based on the historical drilling that is available from the Seymour Property and from adjacent properties, independent consultants Stagg Resource Consultants have determined that the Seymour Property contains an exploration target in these three seams in the combined range of 42 to 48 million tonnes of hard coking coal.
Additionally, based on the historical drilling that is available, Stagg has determined that the Seymour Property contains an exploration target in the Big Bone seam of the order of up to 45 million tonnes.
This seam, which has a slightly higher ash content than the typical ash content of the Gurnee seams of about 6%, is considered to have longer term potential for use as a blend in a hard coking coal product.
A detailed drilling program will be undertaken to further assess the quality of the coal and define a resource to JORC standards.
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