Great Boulder Resources Ltd (ASX:GBR) is trading higher after securing a major land position in the Earaheedy Basin, east of Wiluna in Western Australia, near the recent zinc-lead discovery made by Rumble Resources Ltd (ASX:RTR).
The company has lodged Exploration Licence applications over 1,134 square kilometres of prospective stratigraphy including more than 60 kilometres of strike highlighted by pathfinder geochemistry, with the project to be named Wellington.
Following the announcement by Rumble of a major zinc-lead discovery at its Earaheedy Project on April 19, the company lodged three new tenement applications over a second zinc-lead target identified to the southeast of that project.
The new tenements overlie the prospective Frere Formation within the Proterozoic Earaheedy Basin, with targets generated by GBR from analysis of publicly available geochemical data sets.
Investors have responded positively with shares almost 28% higher this afternoon to 4.6 cents with more than 29 million securities changing hands.
“Exciting development”
Managing director Andrew Paterson said: “This is an exciting development for Great Boulder as it gives us a massive landholding with a compelling large-scale target over a major new zinc-lead province in Western Australia.
“Having previously completed the targeting study during 2020, we were following Rumble’s progress closely and we were able to act quickly on Monday to secure these tenements as soon as the scale of Rumble’s discovery became apparent.
“This doesn’t impact any of our current exploration priorities in the medium term.
“In effect, it’s a free option over an emerging, world-class base metals province that has the potential to add serious value to our project portfolio.”
Great Boulder first identified prospective areas in the Earaheedy Basin in mid-2020 during a desktop study of the province’s regional potential, following initial promising drill results by Rumble.
The potential of the region was further validated by Rumble’s recent results which underpin a shallow, large-scale exploration target of 40 to 100 million tonnes at 3.5% to 4.5% zinc and lead over 40 kilometres of strike.
Low impact regional exploration
Once granted, the company intends to commence low-impact regional exploration such as soil sampling, mapping and reconnaissance to confirm target areas.
Geophysical surveys such as gravity and airborne magnetics are also expected to play a key role in identifying structures likely to influence mineralisation within carbonate horizons within or at the base of the Frere Formation.
While this project provides an exciting addition to Great Boulder’s exploration portfolio, the company remains focused on the Whiteheads and Side Well gold projects as it also systematically evaluates the Wellington Project.