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True North Copper Limited (ASX:TNC) (True North, TNC or the Company) is pleased to announce results from a systematic rock chip sampling campaign at the Aquila and Ivena North prospects, part of its 100% owned Mt Oxide Project, located 140km north of Mt Isa in Queensland.
HIGHLIGHTS
- Assay results received from a successful rock chip sampling program at the Aquila and Ivena North prospects, part of TNC’s 100% owned Mt Oxide Project in Queensland.
- Aquila and Ivena North are both part of the larger Dorman Fault Mineral System, a +10km long trend that hosts the Vero Cu-Ag-Co Resource and the Camp Gossans Prospect.
- At Aquila, sampling has highlighted six zones of anomalous Cu, Co & As associated with multiple gossanous breccia structures up to 30m wide.
- Aquila B Trend: +180m long and +30m wide Cu +/- Co-As-Ag within a 440m long fault breccia with visible copper oxide mineralisation. The trend includes rock chip channels returning 3.6m @ 0.49% Cu with a peak assay of 0.94% Cu.
- Aquila A Trend: +20m long and up to 12m wide Cu-As-Sb anomalous zone within +210m strike of hematite altered hydrothermal breccias, returning up to 0.05% Cu and 12.7g/t Ag and anomalous pathfinders.
- Aquila D Trend: +100m long and up to 4m wide Cu-Co trend associated with a historical prospecting pit with strong copper oxide mineralisation, and a peak assay of 0.87% Cu.
- At Ivena North, sampling has identified Cu, Co & As trends within two geochemically anomalous zones from multiple gossanous breccia structures that are up to 25m wide.
- Ivena North A Trend – +130m long and up to 15m wide Cu-Co-As trend within a +580m strike of hydrothermal breccia and gossans that returned assays up to 1.38% Cu and anomalous As +/- Ag-Sb-Bi-Mo.
- A combined 680m strike length of mapped hematite silica gossans remains under-sampled between the Aquila and Mt Gordon Prospects.
- Rock chip results will be integrated with ongoing mapping and results from the Queensland Government-funded MIMDAS IP and MT survey, which is currently underway along the Dorman Fault Mineral System.
The rock chip sampling program has successfully identified new broad zones of strongly anomalous copper and pathfinder elements. The copper grades and pathfinder anomalism returned in the samples are at levels consistent with other outcropping leached gossans associated with historic drill discoveries in the region.
The Ivena North and Aquila prospects are located along strike northwest of the high-grade Vero Cu-Ag-Co resource (Vero). Both prospects are high priority exploration targets for TNC, with a MIMDAS Induced Polarisation (IP) and Magnetotellurics (MT) geophysical survey continuing at Mt Oxide to test for geophysical anomalies coincident with outcropping geochemically anomalous gossans1, 3.
COMMENT
True North Copper’s Managing Director, Bevan Jones said:
“Our exploration team has been working hard to systematically map and sample the +10km Dorman fault trend at Mt Oxide. Multiple gossans have been identified, and rock chip results from the gossans are revealing large areas of wider and stronger mineralisation on which to focus our future exploration work, including the ongoing MIMDAS geophysical survey.
We are also remobilising the on-ground team to systematically collect additional rock chip samples over the newly discovered Black Marlin and Rhea structures. Further geophysical results are filtering through, and updates will be released soon. We are potentially building a significant district at Mt Oxide with multiple high priority targets which have never been drilled. Our next steps include prioritisation of these targets, designing and planning upcoming drill programs, and securing the necessary permits for on-ground access.”
Figure 1. Mt Oxide Project with priority prospects identified within the Dorman Fault corridor.
Summary of Results
During Q4 CY23, TNC’s Discovery Team initiated a prospectivity analysis of the Dorman Fault Mineral System, host to the Vero Cu-Ag-Co Resource (Vero) (15.03Mt @ 1.46% Cu and 10.59g/t Ag M, I & I, refer Table 1)4. Geological and structural mapping delineated a +10km highly prospective corridor of intermittently outcropping gossanous and silica breccias with no drilling, surface sampling or effective geophysics. Since completion of this work, TNC has collected 388 rock chip samples, including 243.5m of rock chip channel samples at the Ivena North and Aquila Prospects where TNC is currently acquiring MIMDAS IP and MT as part of its Queensland Government Collaborative Exploration Initiative (CEI) grant3.
Analysis of the assay results has highlighted eight high priority geochemically anomalous zones within the larger, structurally complex footprint at both prospects with two of these zones remaining open to the north. These anomalies have similar pathfinder geochemical signatures and are within the order of magnitude of the results from Camp Gossans4 south of Vero, which are considered analogous to the leached gossan outcrops at the Esperanza South deposit4.
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This article includes content from True North Copper, licensed for the purpose of publishing on Investing News Australia. This article does not constitute financial product advice. It is your responsibility to perform proper due diligence before acting upon any information provided here. Please refer to our full disclaimer here.
TNC:AU
Loyal to Acquire the High-Grade Highway Reward Copper Gold Mine
Key Highlights
- Loyal secures binding option to acquire the Highway Reward Copper Gold Mine in Queensland, Australia - one of the world’s highest-grade copper mines, with past production totalling 3.65Mt at 5.7% Cu and 260kt at 4.5 g/t Au.
- The acquisition is the first step in Loyal’s 2025 Strategic Plan to broaden its critical minerals portfolio into copper.
- No exploration has been conducted on the granted mining leases since operations ceased in July 2005 despite a ~680% increase in copper prices and a ~1,256% increase in gold prices since the 1997 feasibility study.
- Significant increase in copper and gold prices, combined with the previous exclusion of gold in sulphides from the mine plan, highlights the enhanced remnant copper-gold potential.
- Exploration potential for new discoveries both along strike and at depth, as previous mining only reached depths of 220 metres for open pit and 390 metres for underground operations, with limited exploration beyond mined zones.
- With $4.4 million in funding, Loyal is well-positioned to revisit the high-grade Highway Reward Copper Gold Mine by deploying modern exploration techniques. With global initiatives to enhance energy grids and no USA tariffs on Australian copper, the outlook for copper is strong and unencumbered.
Loyal‘s Managing Director, Mr. Adam Ritchie, commented:
"We are thrilled to secure this incredibly rare opportunity for our current and future Loyal investors. The Highway Reward Copper Gold Mine, considered one of the highest-grade copper mines in the world, is now primed for a revisit after 20 years of dormancy.
The granted mining leases of the Highway Reward mine provide an amazing speed to market opportunity - especially when both copper and gold are near all-time highs. The short-term and long-term opportunities at Highway Reward are exciting, considering the significant growth in commodity prices since the 1997 feasibility study. Copper is driving our electric future and gold continues to play an important role in our global economy.
Whilst a lot has changed in the past 28 years, the unwavering demand for copper and gold has only intensified. This is truly an amazing opportunity to unlock and showcase the immense potential of this forgotten mine. With modern technology and innovative mining techniques, we believe the Highway Reward Copper Gold Mine will provide exceptional value and returns to our Loyal shareholders."
Figure 1 Highway Reward Copper Gold Mine: Located 37 km south of Charters Towers within the Mount Windsor Volcanic Belt. Accessible via an all-weather highway, 172 km from the Port of Townsville, Queensland, Australia.
The Highway Reward Copper Gold Mine is located only 37 km from the active mining town of Charters Towers in Queensland, Australia, within the Mount Windsor Volcanic Belt. This area is renowned for its rich history in copper and gold mining, with strong social license support for mining activities. It features large-scale mining operations such as, Newmont’s 3.2 Moz Mt Leyshon gold mine and Yuxin Holding’s 3.4 Moz Pajingo gold mine. The region is close to the polymetallic, Thalanga Processing Plant and the Mount Carlton Processing Plant, with road and rail to Glencore’s Mount Isa copper hub, Townsville copper refinery and the Port of Townsville.
With the growth in commodity prices and advancements in exploration and mining technologies, the potential for remnant copper-gold mining has significantly improved. Previous mining operations targeted copper within chalcopyrite, while gold associated with both chalcopyrite and pyrite was excluded from the mine plan. With lower copper equivalent cut-off grades (copper & gold), higher continuity of copper-gold can be drill tested to demonstrate the reasonable prospects for eventual economic extraction and mineral resource potential.
Graph 1: Highway Reward Copper Gold Mine - mining ceased in July 2005: 28 Years of Commodity Growth
Significant potential will be assessed and areas tested for copper-gold extensions to subvertical trends, that may exist below current mining levels at the Highway Reward Copper-Gold Mine. The previously mined, copper-gold rich pipes will also be assessed for drill testing along strike (Figure 2). Previous mining and surface mapping geological observations illustrate that high- grade copper-gold pipes have been identified in dacite, rhyolite, and volcaniclastic host rocks, therefore strong prospectivity exists for discovering additional pipes beyond the historically mined zones in all rock types on the property, except recent overlying sediments that conceal the basement host rocks (Figure 2). No modern advanced geophysical techniques or data processing methods have yet been applied to assess this potential.
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This article includes content from Loyal Metals Limited, licensed for the purpose of publishing on Investing News Australia. This article does not constitute financial product advice. It is your responsibility to perform proper due diligence before acting upon any information provided here. Please refer to our full disclaimer here.
