Doug Bright

Kalgoorlie Gold Mining has extended a prospective gold strike at its Pinjin project in Western Australia to 21km after being granted a new 3.5-square-kilometre parcel of contiguous ground at the site that sits 140km north-east of Kalgoorlie. The ground is centred about 3.75km south along strike from the company’s Wessex target and about 8km north along strike from its Kirgella Gift and Providence gold prospects.

Meeka Metals has secured a greater-capacity ball mill than envisaged in its definitive feasibility study in May for its Murchison gold project in WA, paving the way for significantly enhanced economies of scale. The company says the $318,000 purchase reduces its DFS mill capex by 75 per cent, lifts processing capacity by 30 per cent to 640,000 tonnes per annum and increases ore processing options.

Middle Island Resources has kicked off its first round of drilling for the year, with three deep diamond drillholes to test three iron oxide-copper-gold (IOCG) targets at its Barkly “super project” in the Northern Territory. The program entails three holes targeting depths between 600m and 650m, constituting the company’s maiden testing of the Wilma, Pebbles and Dino IOCG prospects within its Georgina project.

Kalgoorlie Gold Mining is planning to kick off an air-core drilling program at its Pinjin project in WA’s Eastern Goldfields next month to follow up an April campaign that hit zones running up to 3.07g/t gold. The program will centre on the company’s Wessex target at the project that sits on the eastern flanks of the prospective Laverton Tectonic Zone, about 140km north-east of Kalgoorlie.

Buxton Resources is aiming to get back in the black – the black-coloured carbon at its Graphite Bull project in Western Australia’s Gascoyne region, that is – when it kicks off a new diamond drill program to explore deep geophysical targets in the hope of expanding its existing resource numbers. The company’s two diamond drillholes have been designed to target potentially significant extensions of its graphite mineralisation.

Ardea Resources has launched a $98.5 million definitive feasibility study, fully funded by a powerhouse Japanese consortium, for its giant Goongarrie Hub nickel project that sits 70km north-west of Kalgoorlie in WA’s Eastern Goldfields region. The Goongarrie Hub is an integral part of the company’s Kalgoorlie nickel project that embraces a collection of deposits combining to host what it says is the biggest nickel-cobalt resource in the developed world.

Aruma Resources has wasted little time in firming up confidence at its new Bortala project in the Mount Isa Copper Belt after an initial appraisal at the site confirmed some promising copper-gold targets. The acquisition revealed only in late May was part of what management described as potentially “company-changing” gains of two copper operations in Queensland and a highly-prospective IOCG and uranium play in SA.

American West Metals has nailed 20m of copper at 2.3 per cent from 38m including 8m at 5.3 per cent in a drill campaign designed to test an electromagnetic (EM) anomaly at the “Gap” within its Storm project in Canada. The 8m intercept also jagged another 3m interval at 7 per cent copper from 41m, confirming the strong correlation between copper mineralisation and EM anomalism.

GreenTech Metals has kicked off its mission to lift the resource numbers at its Whundo base metals project in Western Australia’s West Pilbara region after cranking up a new 2200m reverse-circulation drilling program. The company flagged the program a fortnight ago, about a month after revealing that an extensive review, based largely on geophysics, had confirmed significant additional resource potential at the project.