Meeka Gold Ltd (ASX:MEK) says 13,000 metres of aircore drilling at the Circle Valley Project in the Albany-Fraser Mobile Belt of southern Western Australia has been “extremely successful” in defining new gold zones and favourable horizons for REE mineralisation.
Two new regolith gold targets have been picked out by the company coincident with a magnetic feature extending 5.5 kilometres east to the Fenceline prospect.
The drilling was designed to cross the interpreted strike of the two shear zones observed in the aeromagnetic data, with gold mineralisation intersected over lengths of 700 metres and 350 metres respectively.
These new zones of gold mineralisation offer a significant exploration target, and the company plans to follow up lines of aircore drilling to further test this shear system in the second half of the year.
While this regional aircore drilling was in train, a more focused drilling program was completed at the Anomaly A prospect, which was successful in defining the strike of mineralisation to the east and west of the reverse circulation (RC) drill hole completed in January that intersected 36 metres at 2.69 g/t gold.
Based on this improved understanding of the strike of mineralisation at Anomaly A, the company has kicked off a program of deeper RC drill holes to test the interpreted shear zone below these aircore results.
Circle Valley Project aircore drilling results.
Rare earth elements on the horizon
Regionally, the aircore drilling has also intersected a regolith profile of 10-to-20-metre-thick orange/red coloured upper saprolite clays within the 20-metre thick saprolite layer.
This orange/red upper saprolite horizon corresponds with the orange/red upper saprolite profile intersected 3 kilometres to the west during the 2021 aircore program, which has subsequently been shown to host significant intervals of rare earth element (REE) mineralisation, including:
- 12 metres at 1,003 parts per million (ppm) total rare earth oxide (TREO) within 36 metres at 672 ppm TREO from 28 metres; and
- 4 metres at 877 ppm TREO within 23 metres at 514 ppm TREO from 48 metres.
These thicker zones of REE mineralisation sit on the margin of a large paleo-drainage feature identified in an airborne electromagnetic survey data compiled by Nova Energy Limited in 2007 while it was exploring for uranium.
The exploration model pursued by Nova at the time was a redox-type uranium deposition at the margin of paleo-drainage channels. Meeka’s hypothesis is that the paleo-drainage feature could also result in significant deposition of REE at the margin of the channel.
Strike potential
Commenting on the progress at Circle Valley, CEO Tim Davidson said: “These results are very exciting for the team as we are beginning to understand the geology and the various styles of mineralisation, both gold and REE, that exist at Circle Valley.
“The two new gold zones identified in the north of the tenure are significant in both width of anomalism and strike potential. Both are located on the same shear zone as the Fenceline prospect 5.5 kilometres to the east where gold mineralisation has also been intersected in aircore drilling.”
What’s next?
The company is waiting on 4,700 metres of drill samples, which are at the laboratory and waiting to be assayed for gold, while REE assay results from the 2022 aircore drilling program and further REE assays from the 2021 drilling program remain pending.
“With the conclusion of aircore drilling and while we wait for the remaining gold and REE assays to be returned from the laboratory, we have commenced drilling a number of RC holes at Anomaly A to test for gold in the interpreted shear zone below the aircore drilling,” Davidson said.
“We expect to receive further gold and REE results from the laboratory in the coming week and look forward to updating shareholders with respect to these results as they are received.”