An area comprising two separate sub-blocks centred ~115 km south-southeast of Coober Pedy and located to the west of the Stuart Highway is being explored for Archaean to Palaeoproterozoic banded iron formation iron ore mineralisation of economic grades and quantities that may occur under cover in the near surface bedrock. Known occurrences of iron ore in the Hawks Nest region comprise a cluster of seven prospects within Block “A” of the subject tenement, the Giffen Well prospect within Block “B”, and several occurrences lying outside of the licence to the north-east. During the initial licence reporting year (1999-2000), no field work was done. During licence Year 2, AuIron Energy Limited (AuIron), on behalf of its subsidiary SASE Pty Ltd, undertook an iron ore appraisal drilling campaign between March and May 2000 which was designed to upgrade the resource status of two known iron ore occurrences on EL 2587 that had been previously identified by MESA. The intent was to confirm the existence of sufficient iron ore feedstock for the initial 25 years of operation of a commercial 2.5 Mt/year Ausmelt smelter that was planned to be constructed by SASE in the vicinity of the Gina Siding on the Tarcoola - Alice Springs Railway, ~45 km west of Hawk’s Nest. AuIron's reviewing of the MESA drillhole data had suggested that the Kestrel deposit had the highest likelihood, at its current stage of exploration, to provide a large tonnage, long term base load feedstock, whereas the Buzzard deposit could provide higher grade iron ore that was potentially “direct smelting ore” (generally known as DSO). Consequently AuIron completed programmes of infill drilling on both of these targets. A total of 14,914.75 m of drilling (12,284 m of RC and 2,630.75 of diamond coring) was completed. A regional evaluation of the iron ore potential of the rest of EL 2587 was also carried out, based on remote sensing data and the interpretation of regional geophysical data. During licence Year 3, independent ore reserve consultants Hellman & Schofield Pty Ltd were retained by AuIron to estimate the iron resource grades and volumes for the Kestrel and Buzzard deposits based on all available drilling data. At a 30% Fe cutoff grade, to 135 m below surface, Kestrel was calculated to contain total Measured, Indicated and Inferred Mineral Resources of 220 Mt @ 36% Fe. At a 55% Fe cutoff grade, to 125 m below surface, Buzzard was calculated to contain total Measured, Indicated and Inferred Mineral Resources of 6.7 Mt @ 60% Fe. With the objective of identifying any further higher grade haematite targets analogous to Buzzard, a detailed gravity survey of 2268 stations was undertaken at Hawks Nest in October-November 2000, on a grid aligned along a prominent gravity linear defined in previous data. Gravity stations for this survey were read at 25 m intervals along twenty-eight x 2 km long lines spaced 200 m apart. Dr Rod Eddies of Earth Solutions was retained by AuIron to perform an interpretative review of the results from this survey, as well as to undertake the reprocessing of and a re-interpretation for open file magnetic and gravity datasets derived from surveys previously carried in the same area by MESA. Metallurgical testing of the Hawks Nest magnetite ore was begun under the direction of consultants Promet Engineers Pty Ltd. Stage 1 investigations performed by Amdel examined the effects of different ore head material grind size on magnetite recovery through a magnetic separator, using four typical drill core samples. In May 2001, a first partial relinquishment of EL 2587 was made by SASE, when it became reduced in area by 573 square km or ~25.2% of the originally granted size, through dropping tenure of five separate peripheral parts of both licence sub-blocks. These were portions of ground showing low magnetic and gravity relief in the regional geophysical data, which had been taken to indicate either: a) that thick cover sedimentary sequences of Cretaceous or Quaternary age blanket the basement in these areas, and hence, should iron mineralisation be present, it would be difficult to detect and most likely uneconomic to mine; or alternatively, b) the basement metamorphic rocks contain low amounts of high density and/or magnetic iron - containing minerals. During licence Years 4 and 5 [reported together in early 2004], Minotaur Resources was the operator for all exploration activities while the option (to purchase the tenement) was in force. Finding possible shallowly buried IOCG type massive sulphide mineralisation was the main objective of the work undertaken after February 2003. Minotaur had earlier contracted geophysicist Chris Moore to perform 2D and 3D inversion modelling of the 15 mGal amplitude main gravity anomaly at Hawks Nest, and in January 2003 he reported that he had identified some possible shallow source dense bodies as suggested drill targets. Petrophysical property measurements (141 readings), petrological examinations (5) and assaying (5) were done on selected BIF core samples from stored historical CRAE drillhole DD88HN1 early in 2003. In March 2003, part of a detailed ground gravity survey, with a coverage subset comprising a total of 330 stations, was read over three small separate grids located adjacent to and south of the Bulgunnia Shear Zone, at either 1 km x 500 m or 500 m x 250 m station spacings. The grids were located south-west of Hawks Nest and between 10 and 13 km away from there, within the Black Oak paddock of The Twins Station. In April 2003, three semi-coincident gravity/magnetic anomalies as defined by the detailed gravity data were tested by drilling 3 vertical RC holes for 777 m. 45 basement drill cuttings samples were assayed for gold and base metals. The source of the Billah anomaly was not explained by the rocks encountered there, but magnetite-haematite BIF units with up to 40% Fe content which were penetrated at Stafford Swamp and Hallam Rise did explain those gravity and magnetic anomalies. However, since no evidence of IOCG type rock alteration was seen, it was decided that no more work was warranted. Shortly afterwards, BHP Billiton chose to cease participation in the option and access agreement for EL 2587. Because Minotaur was aware that previous exploratory RC drillholes within the Hawks Nest region had revealed widespread gold anomalism within basement lithologies which is closely associated with iron-rich rock types (e.g. in hole HKN99, 4 m @ 4.3 g/t Au, and in hole HKN53, 4 m @ 0.59 g/t Au), the company acting alone in May-June 2003 undertook an initial reconnaissance soil calcrete geochemical sampling programme comprising 194 samples to infill places previously not so sampled, and to follow up anomalies generated from earlier auger sampling. The gold-in-calcrete assay results upgraded one of those earlier gold anomalies, and also delineated a separate broad regional anomaly requiring further follow-up. So next, 105 infill calcrete samples were collected within the latter anomaly, which showed that it is less coherent than was expected and had now 'dissolved' to only contain a few much smaller spot high gold value clusters, thereby lowering its prospectivity. Nevertheless, in December 2003, Minotaur decided that it would test the three largest of the regional infill sampling spot gold-in-calcrete highs by drilling 49 vertical aircore holes for 837.9 m along seven traverses. Covered bedrock lithologies ranged from weathered ?Bulldog Shale, or weathered older saprolite, to granitic rocks having minor sericite alteration. Disappointingly, only minor copper and gold values were returned from assaying 309 drill cuttings samples. After this, Minotaur chose not to exercise the licence purchase option, and withdrew its participation. On 8/4/2004, tenure of a much reduced (by 1217 square km or ~73.6%) area of the licence (still in the form of two separate sub-blocks) was renewed by SASE Pty Ltd for a second five-year term, as EL 3196. All of the ground deemed not to be highly prospective for magnetite BIF was dropped, as three large portions.