White Rock Minerals Ltd (ASX:WRM, OTCQX:WRMCF) made strong progress during the December quarter, well-funded with A$5.8 million in hand, as it ramps up exploration across its portfolio in Australia and Alaska.
During the quarter, the company made considerable drilling progress at Morning Star Mine within the Woods Point Gold Project in Victoria where it is accelerating exploration with the aim to support potential recommencement of production this year.
A 1.5-kilometre-long Wallaby-Eldorado-Shakespeare trend has been identified at Woods Point as a high priority exploration target for the 2022 regional exploration program.
In Alaska, the company has received strong results across the newly identified Keevy VMS Trend with multiple prospect locations being identified along the 30-kilometre-long trend.
Accelerate exploration at Morning Star
White Rock’s primary objective at the Morning Star Mine is to identify and drill areas of the dyke that have the potential to host multiple high-grade gold quartz reefs.
Considerable progress was achieved to this end during the second half of 2021 which included a drilling program at Kenny’s target area that commenced in June and continued into the December quarter.
Additional target areas, such as the Gap Zone and Dickenson South, were identified following a review of data.
Notably, two diamond drill rigs were added to the fleet during the December quarter to accelerate the exploration plan.
Long section of Morning Star host dyke.
Exploration in Alaska
During the quarter, White Rock received positive news from the 2021 field season at its 100%-owned Red Mountain VMS and IRGS project in Alaska, from the Keevy VMS Trend.
The company then began exploring this newly identified trend during the 2021 field season after initial prospecting of stream sediment geochemical anomalies and SkyTEM geophysical conductors continued to find surface mineralisation at multiple prospect locations along a 30-kilometre long trend.
During the quarter, rock chip assay results were returned from massive sulphide with float samples returning up to 16% copper, 8% zinc and 316 g/t silver at Kiwi prospect and up to 14% zinc, 20% lead and 285g/t silver at the Jack Frost prospect.
In addition, processing and modelling of a fixed loop electromagnetic geophysical survey acquired at the Kiwi prospect has identified a strong (conductivity thickness of 40 siemens) and discrete 400-metre-long conductor, just 150 metres below the surface, proximal to the rock chip float samples, that is now a high priority target for immediate drill testing once field operations recommence in 2022.
Newly identified Keevy VMS Trend at Red Mountain.
Updates from corporate
During the period, White Rock appointed AuStar Gold Ltd chief financial officer Toni Griffith as the company's chief financial officer.
In December, White Rock successfully completed a placement to institutional and sophisticated investors raising A$2.25 million at an issue price of A$0.24 per share
Also, a 1 for 4 pro-rata non-renounceable entitlement offer of fully paid ordinary shares is currently open to existing eligible shareholders, seeking to raise to A$9.1 million, closing on Friday, January 28, 2022, at 5 pm.
Looking ahead, the proceeds from the placement and entitlement offer will be used for in-mine and regional exploration activities at the high-grade Woods Point Gold Project in Victoria, recapitalisation of the Morning Star Gold Mine and gold processing facility and for care and maintenance of the mine and working capital.