The program will consist of 37 holes for about 2,400m in total depth. Most of the holes are designed to infill and expand the existing resources in Young Australian with 6 others to test new targets defined recently through geological mapping and geochemical sampling programs.
The Young Australian project consists of four mining leases (ML7511, ML7512, ML90084 and ML90099; 100% QMC interest) and surrounding six sub-blocks within EPM 18912, which is held by Chinova Resources and from which QMC has the exclusive rights to explore for mineralization over a period of eight years until June 2020. In addition, QMC has an option to require Chinova Resources to apply for a mining lease over all or any part of these six sub-blocks for QMC within the timeframe of the agreement.
The prospect also forms part of the Company’s White Range project and had been explored by QMC from 2008 to 2015. A JORC resource update undertaken in July 2016 reported a total resource of 5.1Mt@ 0.79% Cu, including 2.2 Mt @ 0.93% Cu in the indicated category and 2.9Mt @ 0.68% Cu in the inferred category using 0.25% Cu cut-off grade, for the Young Australian deposit. It is worth noting that this resource remains open along strike.
The above information relating to the mineral resources of Young Australian was first released to ASX on 26 July 2016. The Company confirms that it is not aware of any new information or data that materially affects the information included in the relevant market announcement and all material assumptions and technical parameters underpinning the estimates in the relevant market announcement continue to apply and have not materially changed.
The recent geological mapping and hand-held XRF soil sampling programs identified a significant breccia zone in the central north of the prospect, approximately 2,000m northeast of the existing Young Australian resource. This new breccia zone trends near E-W and corresponds to the shoulder of the Young Australian anticline. The strike length of the breccia zone is about 300m and the width is up to 30m.
Limited hand held XRF results show a maximum value of 0.36% Pb for the breccia zone. Sporadic copper grass was also noted in some parts of the breccia zone. Historic geochemical surveys have overlooked this breccia zone as survey lines ran sub-parallel to its strike in an east to west orientation. Three RC holes have been planned to test this new target in the current drilling program. In addition, QMC’s exploration program in 2015 discovered a new mineralized zone (Tank Hill Zone) up to 1,000m long located about 300m east of the main Young Australian mineralized zone.
The best hole drilled on this new zone yielded 26m@ 1.56% Cu from 59m. Subsequent geological mapping and XRF geochemical sampling have identified more breccia outcrops and anomalous copper values. Three holes in the current program were designed to test the possible extension of the important intersections reported from the 2015 RC drilling, particularly in the northern part of the Tank Hill mineralized zone. The Company is very excited about the commencement of drilling at Young Australian and looks forward to reporting the assay results to shareholders in due course.
