Native Mineral Resources Holdings (ASX:NMR) has discovered high-grade gold at shallow levels after drilling three diamond holes at its Blackjack project in Queensland, including an intercept of more than 45 grams per tonne.
The first hole – BJD201 – yielded four metres at 6.27g/t of gold from 30 metres, including 0.49 metres at 45.70g/t from 31 metres; followed by BJD202, which returned four metres at 0.88g/t of gold from 33 metres, including one metre at 2.70g/t from 36 metres and one metre at 4.28g/t from 21 metres.
The third hole – BJD203 – picked up four metres at 1.26g/t of gold from 36 metres, including one metres at 4.05g/t from 37m including 0.32 metres at 5.19g/t from 37 metres, 0.32 metres at 3.34g/t from 37.32 metres, and 0.36 metres at 3.68g/t from 37.64 metres.
These results came from a wider program of 17 holes which NMR is drilling at the site, with this focusing on the twinning of historic holes, plus QAQC work, assessing the reliability of historic drilling to JORC 2012 standards.
This will set the scene for gold production from Blackjack and other assets, starting in the third quarter of this year. Refurbishment work at Blackjack and other Charter Towers assets is progressing as part of this.
Previous and current work has defined Blackjack as having narrow and high-grade mineralisation, with a shallow ore extension to the historic Blackjack lode also present. The latter refers to three existing oxide pits at Blackjack, which were originally mined in the 1980s to a pit depth of 25 metres.
“As we continue to advance our gold production restart plans at Charters Towers in Q3 CY2025, our current drill program at Blackjack has provided initial confirmation of the historic results, returning high-grade intercepts at shallow depths,” Managing director Blake Cannavo said.
“This bodes well to potentially increase mining at Blackjack beyond our initial plans, as we aim to unlock the overlooked value of this deposit in a gold price environment that is much stronger than when it was previously mined.
“We look forward to receiving further results from this program as drilling continues through March.
“The Blackjack deposit is proximal to our Blackjack gold processing plant, which we are refurbishing on schedule and budget… we remain confident of achieving gold production and executing our growth strategy over the coming months.”
NMR has been trading at 7 cents this morning.
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