Pantoro Ltd (ASX:PNR) continues its consolidation of gold prospects in the Halls Creek region of Western Australia by entering a binding agreement to acquire the Mary River Gold Project.
The acquisition, through Pantoro’s wholly-owned subsidiary, Halls Creek Mining Pty Ltd, encompasses most of the historical Mary River Goldfield.
This goldfield, which is 15 kilometres long and 3 kilometres wide, has a mining history dating back to 1885.
“Exciting consolidation of Halls Creek region”
Paul Cmrlec, managing director, said: “Mary River represents an exciting consolidation of the Halls Creek region by Pantoro given its long mining history and close proximity to the Nicolsons processing plant.
“Pantoro owns and operates the only commercial scale gold processing plant in the region and will continue to review opportunities to expand the current operations.
“Pantoro’s landholding has grown significantly through the acquisition of Grants Creek, and now Mary River which we consider to be two of the most prospective historic goldfields in the region.
“Exploration at Mary River will be undertaken in conjunction with continuing programs at Nicolsons and Grants Creek.”
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Consideration for acquisition of the goldfield is $80,000.
The Mary River Project is circa 21 kilometres from Halls Creek and is easily accessible via the Great Northern Highway and the Tanami Road.
The distance by road to Pantoro’s Nicolsons processing plant is circa 50 kilometres.
A large number of small-scale hard rock excavations, along with eluvial and alluvial mines have operated during the Mary River Goldfield’s history.
Large-scale alluvial mining was undertaken as recently as the 1990s.
Largely unexplored by modern techniques
Despite the long mining history in the area, Mary Creek remains largely unexplored by modern techniques.
Few deposits have been drilled and where drilling has been undertaken, it has been extremely limited.
Despite this, historical pre-JORC results available on government databases suggest that very high-grade intersections have been achieved.