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PAPUA NEW GUINEA - Fieldwork suggests high-grade sea-bed system |
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Exploration fieldwork at Nautilus Minerals" Solwara 1 project in the territorial waters of Papua New Guinea suggests an extensive high-grade copper and precious metal sulphide system.
Nautilus has completed the majority of the fieldwork for Solwara 1 with 92 holes drilled.
Nautilus CEO David Heydon says: "We are developing a drill-tested geological model for a seafloor massive sulphide system, with preliminary indications (using XRF-spectography) suggesting an extensive high-grade system.
"We expect assays in coming weeks to show the tenor of the ore body system at depth, in addition to the high-grade massive sulphide chimneys/spires, often 10 metres high, that are perched upon it.
"The remote operated vehicle drill which sits on the seafloor recovering drill cores up to 19 metres in length has gone from an idea, to design, to implementation within a year. This is a significant technical achievement - and bodes well for future exploration and mining activities.
"We are now looking to future campaigns and considering new drills to increase productivity, further improve core recovery and, more importantly, provide the ability to test the systems to greater depth."
Drilling shows the average core recovery for massive sulphide intercepts of 72%. The drilling is mostly adjacent to the exposed high-grade sulphide outcrop zones defined by previous surface sampling and mapping. The surface expressions of the system are zones of chimneys up to 20m with an average height of about 5-10m surrounded by unconsolidated muddy sediments.
The chimney zones have been sampled at surface with 146 samples reporting an average grade at Solwara 1 of 11.3% copper, 15.2 grams/tonne gold and 4.7% zinc.
The massive sulphide zone which has been drilled to a depth of 19m is dominated by the minerals pyrite and chalcopyrite. The main ore zone increases in thickness towards the centre of the ore zone, to in excess of 19 metres. Many drill holes in the central spine region ended in sulphide mineralization and remain open at depth, with 40% of all holes ending in mineralization. |
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