Silver Mines Ltd’s(ASX:SVL) drilling has extended the high-grade northwest mineralised zone at its Bowdens Silver project near Mudgee in New South Wales.
The assays from the first hole of the 2018 Northwest Zone drilling program returned 24 metres at 150 g/t silver equivalent (108 g/t silver, 0.37% zinc and 0.73% lead) from 283 metres.
This includes 5 metres at 245 g/t silver equivalent from 283 metres and 1 metre at 510 g/t silver equivalent from 306 metres.
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The Bowdens Silver Project area comprises 1,654 square kilometres of titles covering about 80 kilometres of strike of the highly mineralised Rylstone Volcanics.
The project hosts one of the largest undeveloped silver deposits globally with a resource of 128 million tonnes grading 67 g/t silver equivalent for 275 million ounces of silver equivalent.
Potential for underground mining
The insights from initial drilling of the Northwest Zone are encouraging with a high potential to extend the high-grade silver zone towards the source of mineralisation.
With further successful drilling in the area and the continued demonstration of high-grade silver over considerable widths, this zone may have the potential for the development of underground mining tonnages.
After the completion of another hole, the drilling rig will be moved south to the Southwest Zone where an anomalous zone including high-grade zinc coincides with a strong induced polarisation anomaly.