Riversgold Ltd (ASX:RGL) has rapidly expanded the prospective porphyry gold zone at the Northern Zone Gold Project near Kalgoorlie in WA, more than doubling its potential footprint with results from an aircore drilling campaign.
The company drilled 27 holes to blade refusal with the aircore rig, targeting the zone where oxide gold mineralisation meets fresh rock.
As drilling has yet to define a boundary to the gold system, RGL intends to follow up with more targeted exploration.
Riversgold says it's well-funded to pursue the next phase of drilling at Northern Zone, having already contracted a drilling rig for mid-August.
Unearthing Northern Zone potential
“Hot off receiving the results from the recent, successful reverse circulation (RC) drill program at Northern Zone near Kalgoorlie, these aircore results show we have now more than doubled the porphyry footprint than we originally thought, with the full extent of these porphyries yet to be fully delineated," RGL chairman David Lenigas said.
“The vertical aircore drill holes strategically targeted near-surface supergene mineralisation in areas distinct from previous diamond and RC drill sites within the oxide and fresh rock interface, revealing new target zones north and south of our existing RC and diamond drilling locations.
“A new drill program is expected to start around mid-August to infill supergene zones identified with the last round of drilling.
“We look forward to resuming drilling operations shortly with the view of testing and further expanding this large porphyry system.”
Drilling contractor Australian Aircore Drilling completed the 1,772 metres of aircore drilling at Northern Zone using a blade to drilling refusal, with the cuttings being logged by RGL geologists.
About Northern Zone
RGL is exploring the Northern Zone Gold Project with the goal of meeting an independently determined exploration target of 200 to 250 million tonnes at a grade of 0.4 g/t gold to 0.6 g/t gold for 2.5 to 4.8 million ounces of gold.
The project sits 26 kilometres east-southeast of the Kalgoorlie Super Pit, with easy access to the Bulong road.
Conceptually, RGL draws parallels between Northern Zone and Saturn Metals’ Apollo Hill Project, discerning similarities based on a PEA statement released by Saturn Metals, which suggests the potential for a sizeable low-grade heap leach operation.