Public Company News

Strike Energy has drilled the intermediate section of the historic Jaws-1 well in the Southern Cooper Basin and is set to begin the critical, horizontal drilling phase of the campaign before flow testing the historic, pure coal seam well at previously untested depths of more than 2km below surface. Investors are now set for a white knuckle ride one way or another.

Southern Gold has secured tenure at another historic gold mining operation, building its impressive portfolio of epithermal gold-silver projects in South Korea. The Aphae project has produced nearly 4000 ounces of gold and lies within a significant alluvial gold field. The mineralisation is open along strike and at depth, with rock chip results returning grades up to 6.08g/t gold and 93g/t silver.

King River Copper will raise a minimum of $6m and up to $18.5m thanks to an innovative underwriting of its soon-to-expire options and a share price that has run off the Richter scale on the back of exploration and metallurgical successes. The company also announced it had pegged 3,000 square kilometres of additional ground, locking up its exciting new gold play in the East Kimberley.

Middle Island Resources has accidentally produced another stunning gold intercept from the Two Mile Hill deposit near Sandstone while drilling a large diameter core hole to collect samples for ore sorting testwork. The latest intercept from a poorly drilled section of the deposit featured 100 metres at 2.02 g/t gold, including 7m at 18.1g/t gold, well above the target grades for the Two Mile Hill deeps deposit.

St George Mining has announced a high grade nickel-copper sulphide intersection from the Stricklands prospect at its Mt Alexander project west of Leonora in W.A. The 13.6 metre intercept from 40m depth contained a 4m section with average grades of 4.7% nickel and 2.0% copper using pXRF analyses. The mineralisation is true width and backs up last years spectacular 17.5m hit going 3% nickel.

ASX-listed specialist pumping company Babylon Pump & Power is gearing up to take advantage of the expected new wave of maintenance related mining activity post the mining construction boom. The company has amassed a $3.3m war chest to gear up its dewatering pumping fleet as it gets ahead of the pack of service businesses that will materialise as the mining industry gets set to take off again.

ASX-listed security surveillance company Spectur has posted a solid 149 per cent lift in sales revenue for the first two months of the year driven by a lift in camera rentals and a successful east coast expansion. The Perth-headquartered security tech play, which now has over 1,100 cameras deployed in the field, says it is also supplying its HD4 camera system to a new tier-one critical infrastructure client.

Peppermint Innovation will develop an app and web tool to provide money transfers to poor, cash-constrained Filipinos as part of a service provider agreement signed with the largest cooperative in the Philippines. The deal brings 300 affiliated cooperatives and one million individual members of the Mindanao Alliance of Self-Help Societies-Southern Philippines Educational Cooperative Centre into Peppermint’s financial frame.

With one positive feasibility study on its desk, Mongolian coking coal explorer, Aspire Mining, has launched another. The first already shows the viability of a rail line to the east of the giant Ovoot coal play and the second will assess the viability of a line to the west. The proposed new line will open up Russian Chinese trade opportunities and underwrite Ovoot in the process.

ASX listed EMU N.L now has three drill rigs working at its Chilean gold project where good recent weather and smooth operations has sparked hope for the imminent release of a flood of assays. The Perth-based explorer is committed to making up for lost time and completing at least 6000m of drilling before the southern hemisphere winter rolls in.

Classic Minerals has announced some encouraging high-grade gold drilling intercepts from the Lady Magdalene deposit at its Forrestania Gold Project. Results include 6.5 metres grading 3.30g/t gold, including 1m @ 9.52g/t gold. The results confirm the deposit contains cross-cutting, shoot style, high-grade gold lodes that are similar to the nearby Lady Ada open pit that was historically mined at 8.81g/t gold.

Another impressive round of high-grade drill hits from Draig Resources has extended the strike length and depth of the company’s Tribune Lode gold discovery parallel to the famed Bellevue mine in the Wiluna belt. Mineralisation has now been confirmed over a strike length of 550 metres and one of the next priorities is to test for continuity with the Southern Belle Lode 800 metres further south.