Doug Bright

American West Metals’ recent metallurgical testwork on copper-mineralised sample material from its Cyclone and Chinook deposits at its Storm project in Canada has successfully generated what it says is commercial-grade direct shipping ore. The testwork employed a two-circuit ore-sorting and inline pressure jig stream, which was shown to produce a range of direct shipping copper concentrate grades with good yields.

Image Resources has confirmed it has received the final approvals it needs to kick off the long-awaited onsite construction of its Atlas heavy mineral sands project in Western Australia’s Perth Basin. The company says it has now secured the vital go-ahead from the Federal Government after it satisfied proposed conditions relating to the Atlas development under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act.

Reach Resources says geophysics, geochemistry and rock microscopy have confirmed a 4.5-square-kilometre oval body as an alkaline intrusive and the likely source of big rare earths-niobium hits at its Wabli Creek project in Western Australia’s Gascoyne region. Wabli Creek is one of two exploration licences held by Reach in the highly-prospective Yinnetharra area that is well-known for its often unusual, but critical mineral assemblages.

A Latitude 66 geophysics survey has identified strong conductors at the company’s K9 prospect in Finland that correlate with multiple conductors down-plunge from known gold-cobalt mineralisation and local shear zone orientation. The significance of the downhole electromagnetic results from two adjacent holes is that they confirm continuity of K9 mineralisation towards the south-west and north-east and also down-dip and down-plunge.

White Cliff Minerals has confirmed the locations of historical high-grade results for a suite of valuable minerals at its two key Canadian projects, defining multiple priority targets for early drilling after completing a maiden field work campaign. Field reconnaissance, mapping and sampling has identified four iron oxide-copper-gold targets at its Great Bear project and multiple styles of copper mineralisation at its Rae play.

Image Resources is continuing its push towards the construction of its Atlas heavy mineral sands project in Western Australia’s North Perth Basin after sealing State Government approval for its mining proposal. The approval from the WA Department of Energy, Mines, Industry Regulation and Safety is another step forward along the development path for the project located 170km north of Perth.

In this edition of Bulls N’ Bears Big Hits, we examine some of the notable drill intersections revealed on the ASX this week, including Far East Gold’s 20m intercept at 7.57g/t gold and 8.5g/t silver from 67.5m. We also take a close look at other interesting drill hits from last week as reported by Vital Metals in Canada and AIC Mines in Queensland.

Octava Minerals is on the cusp of kicking off a soil sampling program in a bid to expand the Razorback gold prospect at its 202sq-km Talga lithium-gold project, 30km east of Marble Bar in WA’s Pilbara region. Despite Razorback showing significant gold intersections in previous drilling, including 5m at 2.23g/t from 24m, only 700m of its interpreted 4km strike has been drilled.

Quantum Graphite says its airborne geophysics have defined a new high-grade graphite zone about 2.5km long in the north-west area of its Uley 2 exploration licence on SA’s Eyre Peninsula. It comes after the company confirmed in April the completion of its helicopter-borne versatile time domain electromagnetic (VTEM) and magnetics survey that was part of its planning for Uley 2 and Uley 3 project extensions.