The company is drilling an initial two holes totalling 1300m under the exploration alliance with Earth AI, a San Francisco-based metals exploration company using an artificial intelligence deposit-targeting system to generate drill targets across tenements.
Earth AI’s system had discovered nickel sulphides in and around the Ordovician Moonbilleen gabbro last year and delineated extensive zones of elevated palladium, platinum and gold as well as other pathfinder elements in June this year.
Legacy Minerals (ASX:LGM) notes that the holes will test the new prospects that are 800m away from first-pass drilling completed in January 2024. That drilling returned PGE (platinum group elements) mineralisation including 32m at 0.5g/t 3E PGE (platinum, palladium and gold) from 386m and 10m at 1.2g/t 3E PGE, 0.2% nickel and 891 parts per million copper from 388m.
Adding interest, these prospects are found within a 2km by 2.5km PGE soil anomaly with >20 parts per billion palladium and platinum along with reconnaissance rock chips samples with grades of up to 1.1g/t 3E PGE.
The new targets include the highest soil assay to date of 330ppb 3E PGE.
“The discovery of magmatic PGE-nickel-copper mineralisation using artificial intelligence earlier this year was a breakthrough for the Fontenoy project, with follow-up work in the form of a detailed gravity survey and soil and rock chip sampling delivering strong targets for drill testing,” managing director Christopher Byrne said.
“The drilling will target newly identified zones of anomalous PGEs-in-soils, which have never been drilled. These targets are also supported by coincident density highs that are thought to reflect potential PGE-bearing lithology.
“Legacy Minerals looks forward to seeing the outcomes of this drilling, which has the potential to deliver significant value for shareholders.
“In parallel with this work, the Legacy Minerals’ field team continues to complete generative targeting work across our portfolio and is also preparing the Drake field office and site sheds for field work programs anticipated to commence later this year.”
Fontenoy contains a number of prospective units such as the Yandilla Volcanics, Warrenoy Diorite and ultramafic rocks of the Wambidgee Serpentinite that are prospective for copper-nickel and cobalt.
Additionally, it hosts a differentiated ultramafic sequence that is prospective for both chromite and PGE mineralisation while disseminated and veined copper-gold mineralisation hosted within the Yandilla Volcanics has a strike length of ~8km.
Historical drilling has confirmed that soil anomalism is associated with broad gold-copper mineralisation intersected along the entire 8km strike and provides encouragement for a number of drill-ready target zones.
However, the project has never been tested for either PGEs or magmatic-related mineralisation.
LGM expects drilling to take about two months to complete and will provide an expected timeframe on the return of assay results at that point.
