Nickel North Exploration Corp (TSX-V:NNX) is defining an exciting new nickel resource at the Hawk Ridge project in northern Québec.
Hawk Ridge checks a lot of boxes, with a 50-kilometre-long belt of strong magmatic copper-nickel-cobalt-PGE occurrences covering 173 square kilometres near tidewater in the mining-friendly province.
The team behind Nickel North, from its board of directors, advisor committee and management team led by CEO Tony Guo, are experienced, successful mine finders.
READ: Nickel North Exploration reveals big increase in inferred resource for its Hawk Ridge nickel-cobalt-PGE sulphide project in Québec
Recently, Nickel North announced a 77% increase in mineral resources at Hawk Ridge to 34.66 million tonnes of inferred resource.
Total inferred mineral resources for four mineralized deposits – Hope Advance Main (HAM), Hope Advance North (HAN), Gamma and Falco 7 – increased by 76.6% to 34.66 million tons at 0.22% nickel, 0.56% copper, 0.013% cobalt, 0.19 grams per ton (g/t) palladium, 0.05 g/t platinum and 0.025 g/t gold.
The resource includes total pit-constrained inferred mineral resources at a C$35-per-ton NSR cut-off increase by 50% to 29.44 million tons. at 0.20% nickel, 0.52% copper, 0.012% cobalt, 0.19 g/t palladium, 0.04 g/t platinum and 0.021 g/t gold, which equates to 0.56% nickel equivalent.
The total underground resource, at a C$100 per ton NSR cut-off, is estimated at 5.22 million tons at average grades of 0.35% nickel, 0.79% copper, 0.014% cobalt, 0.23 g/t palladium, 0.06 g/t platinum, and 0.04 g/t gold, which equates to 0.88% nickel equivalent.
The project bears similarities to one of the most well-known nickel deposits in the world – the Raglan mine in northern Quebec, which is owned by Glencore.
Nickel North said that higher-grade, Raglan-type sulphide mineralization exists in all four reported nickel-copper sulphide deposits and all of them remain open along strike and down-dip.
CEO Tony Guo said that the resource update puts Nickel North in an excellent position for planning the next large drilling program to further define both high-grade out-of-pit targets and expanding the pit-constrained mineral resources in the late 2022 to summer 2023 working seasons.
Approximately 50% of the Hawk Ridge mineralized structure and mineral occurrences are undrilled or untested and will soon be actively explored.
Ahead of Nickel North’s summer surface exploration program and 2023 drilling program, Guo shared insights into the company’s plans to tap into the potential that exists at Hawk Ridge.
Proactive: Hawk Ridge is a nickel sulphide deposit with good potential for further exploration. What’s particularly exciting about the project to you?
Tony Guo: By the 3D re-modelling to the Hawk Ridge nickel sulfide deposit through resource estimate processing, Nickel North has confirmed there is large potential for the both underground mining targets and the open-pittable bulk tonnage targets at Hawk Ridge.
Tell us about the comparisons that exist between Hawk Ridge and Raglan?
New resource modelling confirmed the existence of a series of Raglan-type high-grade “Potato” mineralization both along the down-dip and strike, which is a new discovery at the Hawk Ridge project. The word “potato” has been used at Raglan to indicate the high-grade mineralization spot within the mineralization zone: it means the high-grade mineralization spots are just like the potatoes in the farmland. Planted by the row’s “mineralization zone”, potatoes can be found along the rows although there are some gaps within in different potatoes.
Nickel North has just put out a very positive updated mineral resource. What’s next in terms of exploration plans and future milestones?
Nickel North has planned a summer field program to start in September 2022 to conduct the step-out shallow drilling program to extend the mineralization strike length and try to discover new high-grade Raglan-type “Potato” mineralization for a larger drilling program in 2023.
Finally, can you give us a quick introduction to the team behind Nickel North?
Nickel North has set up both a technical and management teams by adding Quebec-based experienced geologists such as John Guo who worked for Canadian Royalty Nickel mine as vice president, exploration in the same area previously; Michael Page, who worked for Norilsk Nickel as an exploration manager; Julie Lemieux as director and corporate development advisor, and former Iamgold CEO, Steve Letwin as a senior advisor for corporate affairs.
What else would you like investors to know about Nickel North?
Nickel North is also active in searching for new nickel projects in the rest of Quebec and other places in Canada.
Contact Angela at angela@proactiveinvestors.com
Follow her on Twitter @AHarmantas