Recent geophysics has extended the target envelope at Pennyweight Point – near the Laverton-Leonora area in Western Australia – giving Arika (ASX:ARI) a framework to chase repeats and extensions of known mineralisation.
The first phase of the 5,000m campaign is aimed at testing strike, plunge and depth extensions to standout intercepts such as 35.76m at 2.14g/t gold, 23.97m at 2.54g/t, 14m at 15.48g/t and 30m at 3.86g/t.
Once that is complete, the company will move to high-impact holes over newly defined geophysical targets north and south of Pennyweight Point, before starting the third phase – which will look at confirming mineralisation controls and grade distribution to guide resource estimation modelling.
Recently completed IP surveys across Pennyweight Point and its surrounds have materially improved target resolution and provided a model for identifying extensions to known mineralisation.
The company believes the drilling program will fast-track the path to discovery and help deliver a robust resource for the gold prospect.
ARI managing director Justin Barton said the company was pleased to see the drill rig return to Pennyweight Point, its highest rated and most advanced prospect within Yundamindra.
“Importantly, we return to this exciting prospect armed with the knowledge gained from the important geophysical programs completed in recent weeks, which have delivered significant advances in our understanding of the ore-hosting structures and the likely places where we can find extensions of the known high-grade mineralisation,” Barton said.
“Pennyweight Point is shaping up alongside Landed at Last as the primary focus for initial resource development at Yundamindra.
“With this in mind, the initial phase of drilling will comprise close-spaced, orebody definition drilling before systematically stepping out to extend the deposit along strike and down plunge.”
Barton said Arika now planned to test a series of newly identified bedrock gold targets that resembled the mineralisation at Pennyweight Point itself in terms of its geophysical and associated geochemical signatures.
These targets offer the potential for breakthrough discoveries immediately along strike from the known mineralisation and show why the company is so excited about the potential at Pennyweight Point, he added.
“The new phase of drilling will comprise ~5,000m of RC drilling and will add to the already significant pipeline of drilling results being generated by the ongoing program,” he said.
The four large, discrete, ‘blind’ bedrock targets include PWP1, PWP2, PWP3 and PWP4.
Core Geophysics’ interpretation of data collected from the recent drone-supported aeromagnetic survey over the southern half of the Yundamindra Project area is nearing completion.
Targets generated from this work will be fed into the current drilling program and will be released once data is received.
