Matt Birney

TNT Mines’ Bonanza prospect in the United States is turning out to be just that – a bonanza. It has delivered a smorgasbord of high-grade uranium and vanadium results from underground sampling including 1.25 metres at 2,600 ppm uranium oxide and 1.68 per cent vanadium pentoxide with a series of ‘too hot to handle’ samples yet to be reported by the new lab after being rejected by the first one.

As Hot Chili gets closer to delivering a maiden resource estimate for its Cortadera copper-gold project in Chile, new diamond drilling has continued to expand the exciting porphyry discovery. Wide assays from the first two drill holes in phase three of the drilling campaign confirm the high-grade core within the largest porphyry at Cortadera, known as Cuerpo 3, where the mineralisation continues 800m down-hole.

Blackstone Minerals has continued its seemingly unstoppable run of success in Vietnam with all four drill holes from the company’s maiden drilling program at Ban Chang intersecting high-grade massive nickel sulphides over more than 1,200 metres of strike. Infill drilling at the prospect is now being planned to delineate addition resources for the company’s developing resource inventory and Blackstone’s move into production.

Anglo Australian Resources has encountered deep extensions to the known mineralisation at its Mandilla gold project 20km south-east of Kambalda, with visible gold showing up in its latest diamond drill core. The company says this is indicative of a significant “nugget effect” within the gold mineralisation at the Mandilla East discovery.

ASX-listed gold hopeful, Kingwest Resources, has offloaded a couple of non-core assets that are not part of its flagship Menzies gold project, pocketing just over $2 million which it intends to sink into exploration and development drilling work at Menzies. Kingwest’s Menzies project involves a plethora of old gold projects littered across about 10km of strike.

Ora Banda Mining has banked more impressive RC drill hits from its Riverina South prospect as it eyes a maiden resource estimate for the deposit next month. The company is also looking to get into production at its nearby Davyhurst gold processing plant, 120km north-west of Kalgoorlie – based on initially mining several satellite deposits – in early 2021.

Classic Minerals is barrelling down the road to production at Kat Gap near Southern Cross in Western Australia, with its latest test-work showing exceptional recoveries of gold from simple processing techniques. Test work shows that gravity processing and conventional cyanide leaching recovers up to 96 per cent of the contained gold in the Kat Gap ores, paving the pathway to low cost production.

Impact Minerals looks to be tugging on the tail of a tiger with recent geochemical sampling at Apsley in NSW outlining a sizeable anomaly that flaunts all the hallmarks of a classic ‘text-book’ porphyry copper-gold deposit according to the company. Sampling at the company’s Apsley project has highlighted three priority targets for immediate testing with geophysical surveying expected to commence later this month.

Lindian Resources has further bolstered its senior management ranks with another bauxite expert after experienced Guinea Mining Engineer, Danny Keating, was appointed to the role of Chief Executive Officer. The appointment follows hot on the heels of the company also securing the services of 45-year bauxite and alumina veteran, Yves Occello, as a Non-Executive Director.

King River Resources is targeting high-grade gold in the Northern Territory as drilling kicks off at the Lone Star prospect at Tennant Creek. The company is targeting a series of coincident magnetic-gravity anomalies that it is interpreting as potentially the geophysical signature for the high-grade copper-gold rich ironstone ore bodies found in the Tennant Creek mineral field.

ASX-listed Troy Resources has produced a volley of high-grade gold hits from its latest diamond drill program at Karouni in Guyana, South America returning six separate intercepts with grades running as high as an ounce to the tonne. The results extend a stellar run for the Perth-based explorer with 3 of the 5 holes assayed to date returning multiple gold intersections.

Having made the successful transition from explorer to producer, Horizon Minerals has taken advantage of soaring gold prices to rack up a quickfire $2.93 million in revenue from the first 1,050 ounces of gold produced from its Boorara mining operations 10km east of Kalgoorlie.

Lithium Australia’s patent application to take waste rock from a lithium mining operation and turn it directly into a lithium phosphate product suitable for making battery cathodes received a shot in the arm this week. An international examiner has determined the process is “novel, involves an inventive step and is applicable to industry”.

ASX-listed gold hopeful, Middle Island Resources, looks to have struck paydirt at one of its new satellite deposits at its historic Sandstone gold project in WA, returning bonanza RC drill hits from the Ridge prospect that appears to be shaping up as an open pit ore source in its own right.

TNT Mines has delivered a set of smoking hot uranium samples to its assay lab in the USA where they were rejected due to their uber-high levels of radioactivity – a nice problem to have for a uranium explorer. The samples will now be assayed at an alternative lab in Canada that is better equipped to handle them.

ASX-listed gold developer Calidus Resources has taken multiple steps towards gold production at its flagship Warrawoona project in WA’s East Pilbara region with environmental approvals clearing the way for early construction items to be built at the planned $116 million development. The company plans to commence early capital works – including an access road and a 240-person accommodation village – as soon as next month.

Novo Resources has pulled a rabbit out of a hat by snapping up Millennium Minerals and its Golden Eagle gold processing plant at Nullagine in WA. The bold move sets the stage for the company to become Australia’s first conglomerate gold producer.

Great Southern Mining continues to churn out the high-grade drill hits at its historic Cox’s Find gold project near Laverton in WA, this time outside of the interpreted main lode extension. Better assays from recent RC drilling at Cox’s Find included 9m going 5 g/t gold from 142m, within a broader zone of 16m at 3.7 g/t from 138m, and 2m at 14 g/t from 146m.

The results of unlisted Barton Gold’s latest geophysical survey nearby its soon to be restarted Tarcoola gold project in South Australia are pulse-quickening. The company says it has identified a 3.5km-long trend or geological “channel” that may be harbouring look-alike gold deposits to the existing Perseverance open pit at the rapidly developing Tarcoola gold project.

ASX-listed aspiring manganese developer, Element 25, has ticked a major box at its proposed low-CAPEX Butcherbird project in the Pilbara, this week declaring the site has sufficient process water supply to support production. The company says it successfully pump tested a water bore within a shallow aquifer and determined the project has enough water for proposed production operations.

ASX-listed Troy Resources has returned multiple hits at its Karouni gold project in Guyana, South America, with its Smarts underground prospect throwing up drill numbers like 19m at 9.15 g/t gold from 173m down hole, including 5m going 24.24 g/t gold. Troy has also produced almost 13,000 ounces of gold from its open pit operations since mining re-commenced in January this year.

ASX-listed Lithium Australia, via its subsidiary, the Very Small Particle Company or “VSPC”, has refined the process for the production of its lithium ferro phosphate battery cathode powders, reducing the chemical input costs by 20 per cent in the process. Lithium phosphate raw materials produced using VSPC’s optimised process returned excellent electrochemical results, according to the company.

ASX-listed Canada gold explorer, Ardiden, is gearing up for a very detailed airborne geophysical survey of the New Patricia prospect at its high-grade Pickle Lake gold project in north-western Ontario in Canada as the historic mining area gets its first taste of aerial survey work in 45 years.

Neometals has joined forces with multi-billion-dollar German metallurgical powerhouse, SMS Group, to develop the company’s proprietary lithium battery recycling technology. Under the terms of the joint venture, the companies will form Primobius GmbH to commercialise Neometals’ lithium-ion battery recycling technology with the recovered product set to be used in the growing battery supply chain.

Terrain Minerals is showing impeccable timing, launching a new drill campaign at its Wild Viper gold project in WA, just as the gold price reaches for the stars. The company is set to complete 1,000 metres of reverse circulation drilling across two key targets within the project area north of Leonora. With $2 million in the bank and a bag full of gold targets throughout WA’s rich Goldfield region, Terrain looks set to power through the second half of 2020.

Godolphin Resources has picked up some highly anomalous gold sniffs at its historic Lewis Ponds project about 15km east of Orange, NSW, in the venerated Lachlan fold belt, with the assay numbers swaying the company to now focus its exploration attention on gold at the project. Lewis Ponds lies 20km north of Regis Resources’ two-million-ounce McPhillamys gold deposit.

Eclipse Metals has cleared a critical hurdle as it negotiates a regional land access agreement in the Northern Territory and launches an exploration campaign at its Devil’s Elbow uranium-PGE prospect. The company has reached an agreement with traditional owners to enter into negotiations to approve exploration across the two new leases that surround the Devil’s Elbow prospect, giving it access to key targets in the world-class Alligator River Uranium Field.

Hot Chili has tabled some positive test work from its three copper deposits in in Chile, delivering a common processing route and potentially a high-value product. Metallurgical test work on sulphide samples from the Cortadera, Productora and San Antonio copper deposits confirms the selected processing flowsheet should see over 89 per cent of the contained copper recovered.

Lithium Australia has begun work on its Wundowie nickel-PGE project in the hills east of Perth that were recently made famous in mining circles by Chalice Gold Mines who discovered a cracking nickel-PGE deposit in an area that was previously thought to have limited prospectivity. A first-pass review of the historical exploration data for Lithium Australia’s project has revealed an extensive coincident copper, gold and PGE anomaly.

ASX-listed gold hopeful, Middle Island Resources, continues to eke out promising RC drill results from an array of satellite deposits at its historic Sandstone gold project in the central Goldfields of WA as it works towards the potential recommissioning of the old mine site’s mothballed treatment plant. Latest numbers are from the Old Town Well deposit, located only 600m north of the plant.

ASX-listed platinum group metals explorer Podium Minerals has boosted its coffers by another A$1.1 million after receiving a payment of $711,000 from EV Metals Group for tenement-related costs. Perth-based Podium is also looking to offload its 17 per cent shareholding in EV Metals, who holds the oxide mining rights excluding PGM mineralisation within Podium’s Parks Reef project area in the Mid West region of WA.

Blackstone Minerals looks to have awakened a sleeping giant in Vietnam, after posting a massive, 47-metre-wide, 1.04 per cent nickel hit at the King Cobra prospect within its Ta Khoa project. A maiden resource for the Ban Phuc and King Cobra deposits are due in the third quarter of 2020 and will be highly anticipated by the market given the significant successes Blackstone’s latest drilling campaign has experienced.