The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
Showing consistency of high-grade gold in deposit at Estelle North of 60 Mining News - August 12, 2022
A drill tests RPM South, a gold target that could add to the 1.5 million ounces of gold outlined so for at RPM North.
Click image for larger RPM North cross-section.
Wide sections of high-grade gold cut in the first holes drilled this year at RPM North continue to demonstrate the robust nature of this emerging gold deposit on Nova Minerals Ltd.'s Estelle property in Alaska.
Located about 16 miles south of the 8.1-million-ounce Korbel gold deposit at the north end of the Estelle property, RPM hosts 23.1 million metric tons of JORC-compliant inferred resource averaging two grams per metric ton (1.5 million oz) gold.
With only six holes drilled into the deposit prior to the 2022 season, Nova plans to complete at least 40 more holes to upgrade and expand the resource at RPM North, as well as test the adjacent RPM South target.
This drilling began near RPM-005, which cut an incredible 132 meters averaging 10.5 g/t gold.
Highlights from the first four holes of the 2022 program at RPM North include:
• 140 meters averaging 6.5 g/t gold from a depth of 44 meters in RPM-008, including 56 meters averaging 10.1 g/t gold and two meters averaging 53.4 g/t gold.
• 155 meters averaging 2.4 g/t gold from a depth of 16 meters in hole RPM-010, including 30 meters averaging 10 g/t gold and three meters averaging 56.4 g/t gold.
"The RPM Deposit continues to deliver more thick intercepts of exceptionally high-grade gold," said Nova Minerals CEO Christopher Gerteisen. "These latest assay results confirm continuity and validates broad shallow zones of particularly high-grade gold mineralization from surface within the much larger and broader RPM gold system."
So far, the drilling completed by Nova at RPM North is toward the eastern end of a roughly 1,400-meter-long magnetic anomaly associated with the highest-grade zone in RPM-005.
The company currently has two rigs focused on upgrading and expanding RPM North and one rig carrying out the first drilling at RPM South.
Rock samples collected by Nova geologists at RPM South, which lies about 600 meters southeast of RPM-008, returned assays with as much as 103 g/t gold. RPM South also hosts a magnetic geophysical anomaly that is similar but smaller than the one found at RPM North.
As drilling targets the expansion and upgrade of the 1.5-million-oz gold deposit at RPM, various mine and process optimization, material haulage, and environmental studies for a phase-two Estelle scoping study, which is expected to include both the Korbel and RPM deposits, are underway.
In February, Nova unveiled the results from an initial scoping study based solely on 286 metric tons of indicated resources in the Korbel Main deposit averaging 0.3 g/t (3 million oz) gold, plus 583 million metric tons of inferred resource averaging 0.3 g/t (5.1 million oz) gold.
It is currently envisioned that a central mill and other facilities will be established at Korbel. Ore from RPM and any other satellite deposits outlined across the 125-square-mile (324 square kilometers) Estelle gold property would be transported to this centralized facility for processing.
It is expected that upgraded resources for both RPM and Korbel will be incorporated in a phase-two scoping study later this year and a prefeasibility study slated for 2023.
"We will report further drill results as they are received from the lab for the ongoing 2022 Estelle Gold Project drilling programs and remain on track to deliver the Phase 2 Scoping Study in the near term, before moving into the PFS which aims to increase the gold production schedule and NPV (net present value) significantly, as we continue on our path towards commercial production," said Gerteisen.
In addition to upgrading and expanding the resources at RPM, Nova says the 2022 drilling continues to provide high-quality geological data that is being collated and interpreted to provide greater deposit knowledge.
The nature and geometry of the intrusive units and interplay with structures are key to controls on gold mineralization. These geological and interpretative insights are invaluable in developing further targets for the ongoing exploration programs within the RPM area, as well as several other intriguing targets that have been identified along the larger trend of mineralization that extends across the Estelle property.
Over his more than 16 years of covering mining and mineral exploration, Shane has become renowned for his ability to report on the sector in a way that is technically sound enough to inform industry insiders while being easy to understand by a wider audience.
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