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Hot Chili Limited (ASX: HCH) (TSXV: HCH) (OTCQX: HHLKF) (“Hot Chili” or “Company”) is pleased to announce a new, shallow high grade, copper-silver drill intersection from its Valentina copper deposit in Chile.
- Exceptional grades at shallow depth from the Valentina copper-silver deposit, part the Company’s low-altitude, Costa Fuego senior copper development in Chile
- Drill hole VALMET0002 returned 3m @ 12.1% CuEq from 29m depth down-hole (11.8% copper (Cu) & 52.6g/t silver (Ag))
- The new diamond drill result lies within a broader 12m intersection grading 4.6% CuEq from 25m depth down-hole (4.5% Cu & 16.5g/t Ag)
- Mineralisation in VALMET0002 is dominantly sulphide and amenable to sulphide flotation, thus potential high grade early ore feed to Costa Fuego
- Assay results pending for a further six drill holes at Valentina and twelve drill holes from the San Antonio high grade copper resource
Shallow, High Grade, Copper-Silver at Valentina
The new drill result represents exceptional near-surface grades, providing an exciting potential additional front-end ore source for the Company’s Costa Fuego coastal range copper-gold development.
Assays results returned for VALMET0002, a twin Diamond Drill (DD) hole of Reverse Circulation (RC) drill hole VAP0009 (see announcement dated 8th August 2022), recorded 3m grading 12.1% CuEq (11.8% Cu & 52.6g/t Ag) within a broader drilling intersection of 12m grading 4.6% CuEq (4.5% Cu & 16.5g/t Ag) from 25m depth down-hole.
The result confirms a significant 120m extension of high grade, copper-silver mineralisation to the south of the historical Valentina underground mine and provides material for development-related metallurgical testwork, key to the inclusion of the Valentina Resource in the Costa Fuego combined prefeasibility study (PFS) due in Q1 2023.
Copper soluble analysis has confirmed that mineralisation is principally sulphide (chalcocite, chalcopyrite, covellite) and amenable to flotation recovery, thus key to Valentina’s potential to contribute to early sulphide cash flow generation.
Valentina Shaping as a High Grade Ore Source Addition at Costa Fuego
Mineralisation at Valentina is now defined over approximately 300m strike, and is open at depth and along strike. In addition to VALMET0002, new significant intersections from the phase-2 drill programme also include:
- 5m grading 1.5% CuEq (1.5% Cu, 7.8g/t Ag) from 179m (VAP0017)
including 2m @ 3.3% CuEq (3.2% Cu, 16.4g/t Ag)
- 2m @ 2.0% CuEq (1.9% Cu, 6.7g/t Ag) from 45m (VAP0016)
- 2m @ 1.5% CuEq (1.5% Cu, 9.3g/t Ag) from 68m depth (VAP0013)
- 3m @ 1.5% CuEq (1.4% Cu, 8.2g/t Ag) from 24m (VAP0015)
Results have been returned for eleven of the seventeen phase-2 drillholes with assays pending for six drill holes. Of the eleven drill holes returned, four drill holes recorded significant drill intersections (outlined above), three drill holes intersected the mineralised structure (0.2% to 0.5% Cu), one drill hole intersected historical workings (ineffective), and three drill holes did not intersect mineralisation.
Phase-two drilling at Valentina has focussed on proving continuity of the mineralised trend along-strike and at-depth below the historical shallow underground mine.
Click here for the full ASX Release
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