Alchemy Resources Limited (ASX:ALY) is all set to kick off drilling at its Karonie Gold Project in WA early in 2022 following the completion of two key heritage surveys with no areas of significance identified.
The drill rig has been booked to start in the first week of January 2022.
Government approvals have been granted for the commencement of the drill program.
Drilling will consist of around 7,000 metres of aircore drilling testing the Karonie East targets over a 10-kilometre strike extent with similar structural features hosting Silver Lake Resources Ltd’s Karonie deposits, adjacent to Alchemy’s 100%-owned tenure.
“Hit the ground running”
Alchemy Resources chief executive officer James Wilson said: “We are pleased to have finalised these key heritage surveys, which allow us to execute all planned drill programs in 2022 and beyond.
“We thank the Ngadju and Kakarra people for progressing the surveys in a timely fashion and look forward to a continuing strong relationship in the future.
“Looking forward, we are excited to hit the ground running when we commence drilling at the Karonie East target in early January 2022.”
Heritage surveys
The comprehensive archaeological and ethnographic surveys were conducted in November and December 2021 with the representatives of the Ngadju and the Kakarra Traditional Owners.
These surveys were designed to assess the areas of proposed exploration at the Karonie East, Western Brown, Gilmore, Esplanade and Challenger targets.
Advice from both groups confirms that the areas are clear for stated drill programs to proceed.
First drill program focus
The first drill program, planned for early January 2022, will focus on the 10-kilometre long corridor adjacent to Silver Lake Resources Ltd’s Aldiss mining operations at Karonie East, with targets generated by the recent high-resolution magnetics survey.
Two further drill programs are planned for the Western Brown/Gilmore and Challenger/Esplanade targets to follow during the year.
Phase 2 program
The Phase 2 aircore drill program will begin in early January 2022.
The planned drilling has been refocused on the Karonie East target area as a priority target, after the high-resolution magnetics pin-pointed multiple high tenor structures in proximity to the existing deposits at Aldiss.
Understanding the structural framework of the area has been a key focus over the last nine months, supported by recent detailed field mapping and high-resolution magnetics.
Alchemy has successfully sampled historic holes at Karonie East for multi-element geochemistry, which returned anomalous results, supporting the view that historical exploration did not adequately test this area as previous drilling did not penetrate the younger cover or was too wide-spaced to target the model of short strike length but high-grade structures at Karonie.
Phase 3 program
The Phase 3 drill program at Western Brown and Gilmore will begin in the second-third quarter of 2022.
Western Brown is a newly defined 2 square kilometre greenfields target identified during recent fieldwork.
Alchemy has secured enterprise investment scheme (EIS) co-funding for these targets, which is seen as additional technical validation of its potential to host new discoveries in the region.
Phase 4 program
The phase 4 drill program will get underway in the third-fourth quarter of 2022 and will target Challenger and Esplanade South.
Challenger is a more advanced target that has known fresh rock mineralisation. Intercepts of up to 10 metres at 1.46 g/t gold (from 128 metres), hosted within a thick high-Fe quartz dolerite sill, which is a similar host rock to the mineralisation at Bombora and the Golden Mile.
The Challenger South target is the southern extension of a high-iron quartz dolerite sill that is seen at the Challenger prospect, that is disrupted/demagnetised by a NE-striking fault corridor.
Yellow Mountain mine prospect
In late November 2021, Alchemy hosted representatives of the Condobolin Aboriginal Land Council to the Yellow Mountain Mine Prospect in NSW.
However, following significant rain in the region, part of the access to the prospect was cut-off, so the remainder of the survey will be completed in early January 2022.
The Yellow Mountain Project remains an important strategic landholding for Alchemy with a contiguous land position along strike from the Mineral Hill Mine, which was recently acquired by Kingston Resources Ltd (ASX:KSN).