PolarX Ltd (ASX:PXX) is planning a scoping study on its Zackly gold-copper-silver project in Alaska to assess the key economics, including costs, tonnages and recoveries and take into account Zackly Main, Zackly East and Caribou Dome.
The decision follows the receipt of final drilling results from Zackly East, which further confirms the conclusions reported in December that 4 kilometres of strongly magnetic structures are a high priority for further drilling as they are either known to be strongly mineralised or have the same structure as that which hosts the known mineralisation.
Zackly East sits immediately adjacent to the Zackly Main skarn deposit, where the JORC inferred resource currently stands at 213,000 ounces of gold, 41,000 tonnes of copper and 1.5 million ounces silver.
2020 assay results
Assays have now been received for the final seven holes from the 2020 core drilling program, which focussed on the Zackly East mineralisation to the east of the PolarX discovery holes.
They intersected 55 metres at 2.8 g/t gold and 0.6% copper and 47 metres at 3.1 g/t gold and 0.6% copper.
The most significant results are those from hole ZX20046 and ZX20053, which further confirm up to 57 metres of mineralisation on the very strong magnetic structure, and hole ZX20047, which shows that the mineralisation intersected in holes ZX20035 and ZX20040 continues for another 50 metres along strike.
Next Steps
Drilling has identified mineralisation along 2.5 kilometres of strike-length since work commenced at Zackly in 1981, predominantly along a series of strongly magnetic structures.
Drilling density in the western 1 kilometres of the system is sufficient to formulate a JORC resource.
The company has commenced the following work programs to advance Zackly to evaluate its economic viability, either as a stand-alone project, or in some form of combined operation with Caribou Dome.
The work programs include:
➢ planning is underway for a metallurgical test work program to evaluate processing options for the Zackly mineralisation and the potential for co-processing with Caribou Dome mineralisation:
- Initial work to evaluate gravity-recovery of coarse gold in the Zackly mineralisation;
- Evaluation of subsequent flotation of the gravity circuit residue to recover copper sulphides, silver and remaining gold;
- Comparison of the above dual processing flow sheet with a single phase of flotation only; and
- Comparison of the above results with Caribou Dome flotation results to evaluate coprocessing or batch processing options.
➢ An initial scoping study to evaluate combined mining and processing of Zackly East, Caribou Dome and Zackly Main mineralisation to help determine minimum resource size required for a viable project and whether Caribou Dome can be mined on a campaign basis and processed at Zackly.
➢ Compilation of all available drilling data, surface geochemical sampling, geophysical surveying and spectral analysis into a detailed 3D model, which will be used to formulate the next drilling program at Zackly. Over 2.6 kilometres of strike-length remains untested at Zackly East, and Zackly Main remains open at depth.
➢In addition to the Zackly skarn mineralisation, the recently acquired ultra-high-resolution magnetic data has highlighted a potential porphyry target to the north and east of current drilling, in which a magnetic high is surrounded by a magnetic low, producing an ‘eye’ structure consistent with geophysical models of porphyry-style mineralisation. This target has never been drilled and is a high priority for follow-up.
➢ The company is still pursuing farm-out opportunities for its major copper-gold porphyry exploration plans and expects this to accelerate as COVID-19 restrictions ease and vaccination programs take effect. Significantly more evidence of porphyry presence, including the Mars drill intersection, has been demonstrated since the previous farm-out arrangement was negotiated.