First Au Ltd (ASX: FAU) has delivered a 73% increase in the JORC-compliant inferred resource at the Gimlet Gold Project near Kalgoorlie in Western Australia.
The new inferred resource totals 1.166 million tonnes at 3.2 g/t gold for 120,000 ounces at a 1 g/t cut-off with mineralisation remaining open at depth.
This is 73% more than the previous inferred resource of 69,000 ounces at 3.3 g/t at a cut off 1.3 g/t.
To generate the resource a total of 63 RC drill holes and eight diamond drill holes were used to create a 3D mineralisation framework and weathering surface.
The majority of this drilling was angled and drilled in an easterly direction with the company also utilising earlier aircore drilling when coverage by RC was not available.
Near Kalgoorlie
Gimlet is around 15 kilometres northwest of Kalgoorlie and tenements occupy an area of 9.6 square kilometres.
It is close to existing infrastructure and within trucking distance of five gold mills within the Kalgoorlie area, with several offering the toll treatment of ore to third parties.
First Au has drilled multiple programs since mineralisation was first discovered during aircore drilling conducted in late 2018.
These RC and aircore programs have returned strong intersections, including 3 metres at 462 g/t gold from 52 metres.
The drilling has generally been spaced to 40 metres along the already identified NNW-SSE mineralising trend and covered mineralisation from 30 metres to below 300 metres vertical depth, and around 450 metres in strike length.
Further work required
Further work in regard to improved drill density, grade continuity and geological understanding is required in order to upgrade the inferred resources.
First Au believes the geology in the tenement is prospective for gold as it is dominated by metamorphosed felsic and intermediate volcanic rocks of the Black Flag Group of the Kalgoorlie Terrane, Yilgarn Craton.
The NNW-SSE near-vertical structure observed in the magnetic imagery and geological logging of the drilling appears to persist south of the Gimlet tenement, into the tenements of Horizon Minerals Ltd (ASX:HRZ).
Upcoming work
With the intention of improving the economics of the project, First Au is planning further optimisation work.
The next phase of exploration aimed at increasing the mineralised footprint will involve aircore drilling of new structural targets identified during 2020 litho-structural analysis and which have had limited previous drilling.
These include areas along strike of the Honeyeater and Kestrel prospect areas that are within Horizon’s Binduli Gold Project.