Alto Metals Limited (ASX:AME) has been awarded a grant of up to $150,000 under Round 22 of the WA Government's Exploration Incentive Scheme (EIS) that will allow it to drill test the Chance Prospect at the Sandstone Gold Project.
The EIS Grant will contribute up to 50% of direct drilling costs, which will assist in funding reverse circulation (RC) and diamond drilling to test the prospect, on the eastern side of Sandstone, within the Edale Shear.
Newsflow in coming months
Alto managing director Matthew Bowles said: “We wish to thank the Western Australian Government and the Department of Mines, Industry Regulation and Safety for their funding support to test the Chance Prospect, a compelling around 2-kilometre-long greenfield target, located on a major shear structure which has never been drill tested.
“While our priority continues to remain on our drilling and exploration activities at Lord Nelson and along the Lords’ corridor, we look forward to a maiden drill program at Chance, in the first half of next year.
“With a strong cash position and a major drill program underway, shareholders can expect exciting newsflow over the coming months from the drilling of a number of advanced targets at the Lords’ and exciting new greenfield targets, such as Chance.”
Planned RC program
The Chance prospect drilling will be included in the planned 30,000 metres RC drill program currently underway.
This drill program planned for the remainder of 2020 and into 2021, focuses on the Lord Nelson deposit and the newly discovered Orion Lode, potential repeats along the Lords Corridor and testing the strike and depth potential of a number of other regional targets, including Vanguard and Indomitable.
The EIS contribution of up to 50% of direct drilling costs provides the company with the incentive to include the Chance greenfield prospect within the 30,000-metre drill program.
Chance Prospect
Alto has identified numerous soil geochemical anomalies proximal to the Edale Shear Zone (ESZ), which includes the Edale soil anomalies and the Chance Prospect.
The most extensive of these targets is the Chance prospect, which is about 2 kilometres long gold-in-soil anomaly identified by Alto from detailed airborne magnetics and previous explorers’ surface sampling.
Field inspection confirmed that the Chance anomaly is located within an around 300 metres wide high strain zone of strongly deformed granitic rocks (mylonitic), bounded to the west and east by monzogranite.
A single rock chip sample from nearby historical workings returned 2.47 g/t gold.
Chance Prospect has not been previously tested by drilling and is a priority greenfield target.
The company was previously awarded an EIS grant to drill the prospect but was unable to carry out the drilling due to uncertainty of funding following the various takeover offers received over the past 18 months.