Southern Cross Gold Ltd (ASX:SXG) says drilling at its Sunday Creek Gold-Antimony project in Victoria has identified a mineralised zone hosting both metals which measures 135 metres and is located underneath the historic Golden Dyke mine.
The discovery amounts to a third large mineralised body discovered by Southern Cross at the project – and this one is developing underneath one of the territory’s most prolific historic mines.
In January, the company released an exploration target delineating the project’s other two mineralised bodies – Rising Sun and Apollo – with the new discovery being located 260 metres and 600 metres west of these respectively.
Drilling work focused on seven high-grade vein sets across a 230 metre down hole interval (with an estimated true width of 135 metres) below the Golden Dyke mining area.
From this, Southern Cross picked up ten occurrences of visible gold, nine assayed intervals grading more than 20 grams per tonne (with the highest grade being 124 grams per tonne), and ten assayed intervals of more than 5% antimony (Sb) – with the highest grade of this being 31.5% Sb.
Broad downhole intercepts also included 214.4 metres at 1.3 grams per tonne gold equivalent (AuEq) (1.1 g/t Au, 0.1% Sb) from 320.4 metres including 94.5 metres at 2.3 g/t AuEq (1.5 g/t Au, 0.4% Sb) from 419.1 metres.
The focal hole remains open in an up and down dip sense and is the first hole of several east to west trending holes to test beneath the Golden Dyke mine area. Nineteen holes overall are being processed and analysed, with an additional five holes being drilled.
Managing Director Michael Hudson said the Sunday Creek gold-antimony system was continue to impress in terms of scale and grades.
“The expanding Sunday Creek system coupled with the 60 kilometres of diamond drilling planned over the next year means we are well on our way to meet our aim to double the size of the Sunday Creek exploration target,” he said.
“Golden Dyke now joins Rising Sun and Apollo as the third high-grade mineralised domain in this exciting project.
“Our team’s systematic drill approach led us to the new discovery, after we targeted the main dyke breccia host structure (the “rails” of the ladder) by N-S drilling, as previously reported in drillholes SDDSC125-126.
“Quickly, we were then able to drill SDDSC130, the first drill hole in an E-W orientation beneath the historic Golden Dyke mine, that intersected seven high-grade vein sets (the “rungs” of the ladder) at a high angle, over 230 m down hole interval.
“The mineralisation intersected in SDDSC130 remains open both up and down dip, as well as 500 m to the west towards the historic Christina mine where we have five drill holes pending results.
Shares in Southern Cross Gold moved up in price on the news. At 12:23 AEST, they were trading at $2.82 – a rise of 8.05% since the market opened.