Eclipse Metals Ltd (ASX:EPM) has gained access to the historical drill core from Exploration Drillhole A (Hole A), which was drilled vertically into the centre of the Ivigtût multi-commodity deposit in Greenland in 1948.
Location of Hole A, which was drilled vertically from the bottom of the pit (54 metres below sea level).
Examination of Hole A by Eclipse has served to visually corroborate reports of mineralisation remaining under the present Ivigtût pit floor (Bondam, 1991).
The assessment has also served to substantiate significant grades of zinc in a previously identified southwest-dipping tabular body (Domain 2) located directly beneath Domain 1 of the mined cryolite-fluorite body (Figure 2).
Figure 2. 3D oblique image showing modelled metallogenic domains D1, D2 and D3 below the Ivigtût pit floor. Also shown is the decline, which leads to the historical underground workings.
Spot measurements taken with a portable X-ray fluorescence analyser (pXRF) returned promising zinc and niobium results from certain downhole intervals of Hole A, along with highly anomalous spot values of lead, copper, gold, silver, bismuth, tin and tungsten (Figure 4).
Figure 4. Downhole log for the upper 221 metres of Hole A showing scintillometer, magnetic susceptibility and generalised zinc, copper, lead and niobium pXRF readings.
The upper iron-zinc zone is comprised of quartz, siderite, sphalerite and marmatite (a black, iron-rich variety of sphalerite). Spot pXRF measurements also detected trace concentrations of copper and gold.
The lower iron-zinc-copper zone has many similarities with that of the upper zinc zone but the marmatite of the lower zone is intergrown with chalcopyrite, galena and pyrite (Figure 6).
Notably, spot pXRF measurements detected appreciable levels of copper, gold and silver.
Figure 6. Left image: Half‐core (width ~40 mm) showing marmatite, sphalerite and chalcopyrite from the lower zinc-copper zone (86.2 to 89.9 metres). Right image: Drill core interval showing coarse-grained siderite and marmatite in a quartz host.
Whilst zinc (results ranging from 0.3% to 18.2% Zn), copper (0.04% to 1.7% Cu) and lead (0.05% to 7.7% Pb) are known from the historical Ivigtût drill hole assay data, the presence of niobium as well as gold, silver, bismuth, tin and tungsten warrants further investigation.
Read: Eclipse Metals gets closer to applying for Ivigtût Project mining licence in Greenland
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