Havilah Resources Ltd’s (ASX:HAV) sampling has confirmed and better defined copper-cobalt prospects in the Mutooroo Cobalt District of northeast South Australia, near the mining centre of Broken Hill.
Two new phases of follow-up surface sampling have seen the Sidewinder prospect emerge as a large new Mutooroo-style copper-cobalt target while the Taipan prospect has been expanded.
A potential southern extension to the Mutooroo copper-cobalt-gold deposit has also been identified.
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Havilah’s CEO Walter Richards said sampling results continued to highlight the copper-cobalt exploration potential of the Mutooroo Cobalt District.
Mutooroo a priority
The Mutooroo Copper-Cobalt-Gold Project is a priority for Havilah owing to its higher copper grade, lower capex and an expected production target date of 2021.
Notably, the project has a resource of 195,000 tonnes of contained copper and 8,400 tonnes of contained cobalt.
Sampling forms part of a systematic regional exploration program with the objective to discover additional resources within trucking distance of the Mutooroo project.
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The aim was to confirm and better define the tenor and extent of the promising copper-cobalt prospects.
Richards said, “The prioritisation of the Mutooroo project and the district exploration potential is producing positive results through the application of a low-cost, systematic approach to exploration.
“These results strengthen the case for an expanded regional exploration program targeting additional resources around the Mutooroo deposit.”
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The more detailed, extensional and infill sampling at several prospects returned strongly anomalous copper and cobalt results, mostly within 10 kilometres of the Mutooroo deposit.
Overview of Mutooroo project area prospects on a magnetic image.
A total of 448 composite ironstone samples and 24 orientation soil samples were collected by Havilah geologists at the eight selected prospects in the two sampling programs.
There were 23 samples of greater than or equal to 1,000 ppm copper with the highest individual assay of 2,230 ppm (0.22%) copper at the Sidewinder D prospect.
Sixteen samples were greater than or equal to 2,500 ppm (0.25%) cobalt with the highest individual assay of 3,870 ppm (0.39%) cobalt from Taipan prospect.
Anomalous gold values
High cobalt and copper results are also locally associated with anomalous gold values.
In some cases, the sampling is now sufficiently closely spaced to plan initial shallow drill testing.
The objective of this drilling will be to determine the extent and nature of subsurface mineralisation.
Other prospects still require additional infill and extensional sampling.
Richards said, “We now believe there is high potential for discovery of repetitions of Mutooroo-style copper-cobalt-gold mineralisation at the Sidewinder, Viper and Mutooroo South prospects.
“All of these lie within short distances of the already significant, existing copper-cobalt-gold resource at Mutooroo.”