- Brazilian gold explorer BBX Minerals has been granted a trial mining licence of its EMA tenement.
- The licence is valid until 3 March 2020 and then can be renewed on an annual basis.
EMA is located approximately 30 kilometres from the regional centre of Apui and the land it is sitting on is a Proterozoic volcano sequence know for base metal and gold deposits.
Previous field reconnaissance at EMA identified the presence of extensive historic workings associated with quartz vein systems. The quartz veins appeared to be hydrothermally altered and showed no signs of shearing — rock deformation usually related to compressive stress.
Course gold was recovered from the groundmass of white silica which was hosted in altered rock. The gold mineralisation is directly related to the dilation structures in the major NE-SW fault system.
Most of these old gold workings were concentrated in a wide hydrothermally altered zone with 500-metre line spacings.
The first hydro-metallurgical tests were completed in July 2018 on a one-kilogram bulk EMA sample. This showed 58.16 g/t gold, 442.35 g/t silver, 103.40 g/t tin and 0.22 per cent .
Initial tests of 150 kilogram bulk samples were conducted over an area of 100 metres by 40 metres, revealing two gold/silver rich and copper buttons. These buttons were dissolved and analysed by AAS with a combined gold result of 58.16 g/t.
BBX is currently working with authorities to finalise the granting of its Três Estados trail mining licence.