Meteoric Resources NL (ASX:MEI) has received encouraging gold results in the maiden batch of assays from 2021 drilling at Butchers Creek deposit, which forms part of the Palm Springs Gold Project in Western Australia.
Drilling along Butchers Creek’s anticlinal hinge zone confirmed robust gold intervals, including:
- 57 metres at 1.6 g/t gold from 223 metres, including 18 metres at 3.1 g/t from 234 metres; and
- 32 metres at 1.4 g/t from 266 metres, including 4 metres at 6 g/t from 266 metres.
The ASX-lister believes the fresh results underpin its decision to forge ahead with a scoping study, which will evaluate Palm Springs’ open-pit and underground potential.
Meteoric established its maiden mineral resource for the project in June, confirming Palm Springs as a 357,000-ounce gold play.
Amid the news, executive chairman Patrick Burka has advised that he will revert to his non-executive chairman role with immediate effect.
“One of the largest gold resources in the belt”
Meteoric Resources managing director Dr Andrew Tunks said: “We learned a great deal about the Butchers Creek Deposit from last year’s highly successful drill program …
“In particular, gold mineralisation is stratabound within a single thick syenite unit and that the highest grade and thickest parts of the orebody occur within the hinge zone of a regional scale anticlinal fold hinge.
“This gold mineralisation forms a robust high-grade zone that plunges shallowly southeast.
“This work produced a global resource statement of 5.2 million tonnes at 1.9 g/t for 319,000 ounces of gold, including 1.9 million tonnes at 2.2 g/t for 139,000 ounces of indicated resource.
Meteoric MD Dr Andrew Tunks spoke to Proactive's Andrew Scott about the maiden resource for Palm Springs in June.
“In fact, this makes it the largest gold resource in the belt outside the Nicholsons deposit and we see it as central to any potential new development in the Halls Creek region," he said.
2021 drill season
Throughout the 2021 program, Meteoric set out to improve confidence in the high-grade portions of its Palm Springs mineral resource.
To do so, it targeted the project’s hinge zone position in areas where drilling has been insufficient while testing for continuations of mineralisation outside the current resource.
Over the program, Meteoric completed 10 drill holes, for 3,241 metres and this included nearly 2,000 metres of reverse circulation work and 1,282 metres of diamond drilling.
Broader implications
One of the holes, BCRD483, hit a broad zone of hinge mineralisation, returning the 56-metre gold intersection that included the 18-metre high-grade gold zone, grading 3.1 g/t.
Interestingly, this internal, high-grade hit supports the theory that high-grade shoots exist within the broader hinge zone intersections.
Meteoric will model the shoots to see whether they can be extracted through open-pit or underground mining when it begins evaluation studies.
Similarly, drill hole BCRD484 returned a broader gold intersection — 32 metres at 1.4 g/t — and an internal, high-grade zone — 4 metres at 6 g/t.
This continues to firm up Meteoric’s confidence in the hinge zone’s mineralisation potential.
Meanwhile, two drill holes completed over a section 80 metres south of existing drilling extended the mineralisation at Palm Springs south of the resource.
Hole BCRD489 intersected sporadic mineralisation in an 84.5-metre zone of syenite — a type of igneous rock — while BCRD490 was drilled below this and intersected a significant 48-metre width of syenite on the western limb of the anticline.
The company expects to receive the remaining results from its drilling expedition next month, while regional exploration is underway in a bid to discover repeats of the Butchers Creek potential.
Next steps
In today’s ASX announcement, Tunks said the 2021 drilling program had further fleshed out the company’s mineralisation model.
“The orebody is exposed beneath the historical pit and plunges away to the south, with recent drilling results supporting the presence of high-grade shoots occurring within the thick moderate-grade hinge zone.
“It seems logical from the orebody geometry that development could proceed underground to the south from a substantially enlarged historical open pit."
He said that based upon these results, Meteoric would now move into the following key studies:
- Open-pit optimisations to develop ore immediately beneath the historic pit;
- Underground development scenarios to exploit deepest portions of the resource;
- Initial preliminary metallurgical studies on 2021 drill core; and
- Assessing process route designs.
Ultimately, Tunks believes this activity will feed into the impending scoping study for Palm Springs.
“While proceeding with this plan, we have commenced exploring for repeat orebodies within close proximity of the Butchers Creek deposit.”
Maiden resource at Palm Springs
Meteoric’s Palms Springs Gold Project is a relatively new addition to the portfolio — it was acquired in mid-2020 and complements the company’s other exploration opportunity: the Juruena Copper-Gold Project in Brazil.
The project has already been established as an advanced exploration play, historically producing 52,000 ounces of resource at 2.1 g/t gold from the Butchers Creek open-pit.
Following what the company describes as “an outstanding initial exploration season”, combined with a “treasure trove” of exploration and mining data, Meteoric established its maiden mineral resource estimate at Palm Springs in June.
Specifically, the asset is thought to host 357,000 ounces of gold at 2 g/t gold, with 139,000 ounces at 2.24 g/t in the indicated category and 218,000 ounces at 1.9 g/t in the inferred category.
A large portion of the indicated resource occurs in the floor and beneath the historical Butchers Creek open-pit, providing immediate ore for future development.
Meteoric’s 2021 exploration program set its sights on increasing the resource and converting additional resources from the inferred to the indicated category before the project advances to economic and pre-feasibility studies.
Because of this, Meteoric believes its maiden resource is only the beginning of the Palm Springs story.