Venus Metals is collecting a lot of smoke as it searches for the fire under its Nickel-Copper-Platinum “Julimar look-a-like” targets at its Bridgetown East Project in WA’s fertile South West mineral terrane. The company reported polymetallic anomalies that are closely associated with a 20 kilometre long suite of prospective mafic-ultramafic rocks, some of which even coincide with an aeromagnetic high and a HEM anomaly.
Surface reconnaissance sampling done by Venus late last year encountered platinum-palladium-copper anomalies in laterite which, coupled with historical data, identified four high-priority targets – Target 1 through to Target 4 - in mafic-ultramafic rocks that are prospective for nickel-copper-PGE mineralisation.
Venus said a follow-up geochemistry sampling program was conducted last month with a total of 167 samples collected across four locations within Venus’ tenure. The company said elevated palladium, copper and nickel, up to 5160 parts per million nickel and 462 ppm copper, have identified an additional prospective target – Target 5.
A moving loop electromagnetic, or “MLEM” survey commenced at Target 1 where anomalous nickel-copper-PGE base metal geochemistry are closely associated with previously defined airborne Heli-electromagnetic, or “HEM” anomalies. Initial interpretations indicate a response located along the end of the previously defined HEM anomaly and adjacent to a magnetic anomaly.
Inclement weather and saturated ground conditions over the winter months have proven difficult for Venus to complete the MLEM with the wet ground conditions having affected the data. The company says the survey will recommence when the ground conditions have improved.
Venus’ project is located east of the town of Bridgetown, around 220km south of Perth in Western Australia’s south-west mineral terrane. The terrane hosts an impressive range of world-class mineral deposits that includes the Greenbushes lithium-tantalum operation and the Boddington copper-gold mine. Both are located to the north of Bridgetown.
The company’s tenure takes in the northern portion of what Venus calls its “Julimar look-alike” target, an interpreted 20km-long mafic‐ultramafic complex with a strong magnetic signature and electromagnetic anomalies that may indicate bedrock-hosted sulphide mineralisation.
Drilling by Venture returned an intersection of massive sulphide mineralisation from a maiden drill program of 2.4m going 0.5 per cent copper, 0.05 per cent nickel, 0.04 per cent cobalt and anomalous gold and palladium.
However, it is Chalice Gold Mines spectacular Julimar nickel-PGE discovery to the east of Perth that has revved up the industry’s imagination in the region, with several nimble explorers including Venus clambering to make a headline-grabbing discovery of their own.
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By Matt Birney
