Kalgoorlie Gold Mining says a review of its Kirgella Gift and Providence gold prospects has revealed similarities to Ramelius Resources’ 1.4-million-ounce Rebecca project, suggesting shallow open pit potential.
The project analogy has led the company to modifying its modelling of potential ore zones to distinguish lower-grade, but important gold envelopes enclosing shallow, high-grade zones, with the goal of adding ounces and enabling simpler bulk mining. The two prospects are about 21km north along strike from Ramelius’ ground in the Pinjin Goldfield, about 130km north-east of Kalgoorlie in Western Australia.
KalGold completed a successful reverse-circulation (RC) drilling program late last year, uncovering new shallow gold intercepts from just 20m at Providence, including an intriguing run in one hole of 4m at 1.99 grams per tonne from 24m with 2m at 3.08g/t from 25m. It also contained another 6m at 2.11g/t gold from 80m including 3m at 3.16g/t from 83m.
Additionally, the bit pierced a further 4m at 1.37g/t gold from 91m including 1m at 4.80g/t from 94m and another 2m at 2.58g/t gold from 101m that featured 1m at 4.09g/t from 102m.
And to complement the run, two other holes brought to light 2m at 1.71g/t gold from 20m including 1m at 2.67g/t from 21m and 10m at 1.12g/t from 143m with 2m at 3.42g/t from 145m, respectively.
Management says the results clearly define a northerly plunge in the gold mineralisation towards Kirgella Gift that it believes is associated with a structural intersection target from about 180m – and it plans to check it out in its upcoming work.
Kalgoorlie Gold Mining managing director Matthew Painter said: “As gold prices surge, we believe that there is a clear pathway for KalGold to access its gold resources. The Company is defining thick, shallow gold mineralisation within our projects that is either outcropping (at La Mascotte deposit near Kalgoorlie) or near-surface (at Kirgella Gift and Providence). This provides a unique and exciting opportunity for inexpensive free digging into highly prized oxide gold mineralisation.”
The company says that by identifying the anomalous low-grade gold zones that surround multiple high-grade bodies, it has been able to outline three shallow, thick potential gold ore zones at Kirgella Gift and two at Providence, accompanied by many footwall and hanging wall lodes. As a result, it is pressing ahead with a program to generate an initial JORC-compliant mineral resource estimate for the two prospects.
No doubt, management is keen to ride the new gold price high while it can better support possible shallow open pit mining of what not so long ago was unmineable lower-grade material.
With additional granted tenure at Pinjin, KalGold is taking on a new round of target identification and priority ranking, which it expects will soon be completed and lead to a fully-integrated exploration plan for the project area. Management says it is also developing a coherent 3D geological model of its Kirgella Gift and Providence mineralisation using data from last year’s drilling and is also completely redigitising and verifying its historic dataset in a bid to align its datasets with its strategy of defining shallow, low-cost resources in the Eastern Goldfields.
The remarkable point currently in gold price history could now enable economic mining of surprisingly low grades. And KalGold may well just have the best of both worlds – big, shallow, lower-grade, free-dig gold zones containing high-grade sweeteners to carry the day.
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