- Alice Queen (AQX) begins reverse circulation (RC) drilling at the Horn Island Gold Project in the Torres Strait
- Forty-nine holes will be drilled adjacent to the project’s historic open pit to test AQX’s ability to delineate ore boundaries as part of a current scoping study
- The work will be followed by a preliminary RC program comprising 43 holes to test the profile of legacy stockpiles adjacent to Horn Island’s gold resource
- Shares have closed flat at 1.4 cents on August 16
Alice Queen (AQX) has begun reverse circulation (RC) drilling at the Horn Island Gold Project in the Torres Strait.
Forty-nine closely spaced holes are planned for 1960 metres across a five-by-five-metre grid and to a depth of 40 metres.
The holes will be drilled adjacent to the project’s historic open pit at the southern side of a roughly 500,000-ounce JORC-inferred resource.
The company said the program was designed to test its ability, in grade control, to delineate ore boundaries as part of a current scoping study.
Following this work, Alice Queen will carryout a preliminary RC program comprising 43 holes over 648 metres to test the profile of legacy stockpiles adjacent to the Horn Island gold resource.
In turn, this program will aim to provide an initial assessment of low-grade gold within the stockpiles, which have an estimated volume of more than 3.3 million cubic metres.
AQX maintained that while the program would carry a certain degree of uncertainty, if successful it could benefit potential mining operations as an additional gold inventory.
Alice Queen’s managing director Andrew Buxton said the RC programs had the potential to improve the economics underlying possible future mining.
“We are excited to have these programs underway and to get the results flowing into the current Horn Island Scoping Study,” he said.
“In addition, the Horn Island exploration team, led by Queensland Exploration Manager Adrian Hell, is also busy developing aggressive exploration programs to make further discoveries at Horn Island.”
Alice Queen shares closed flat at 1.4 cents on August 16.