Exploration Licence 2887 Tumby Bay was taken out to cover prospective magnetite rich Banded Iron Formations (BIF) close to the eastern coast of the Eyre Peninsula. Potential was seen for a magnetite concentrate export operation taking advantage of...
Exploration Licence 2887 Tumby Bay was taken out to cover prospective magnetite rich Banded Iron Formations (BIF) close to the eastern coast of the Eyre Peninsula. Potential was seen for a magnetite concentrate export operation taking advantage of simple metallurgy and good infrastructure. Target magnetite deposits form part of an extensive early Proterozoic BIF sequence belonging to the Middleback subgroup of the Hutchison Group. These rocks have been strongly deformed and subjected to high grade metamorphism. This has produced coarse grained magnetite deposits with high iron and low impurities and often reconcentrated into fold hinge positions. Exploration during the first reporting period to 17th January 2003 has included: • 1997-line km of low-level high resolution aeromagnetic data over 6 survey areas. (Carrow, Koppio, Brennand, Kapperna, Oolanta and Iron Mount) to define drilling targets. • Several test lines of high-resolution ground magnetics to compare with key airborne data at Carrow (1.6-line km) and Koppio (18-line km). • A total of 8 diamond holes (plus 3 abandoned) and 11 RC holes for total of 3448 m of drilling at Carrow, Koppio and Iron Mount. • A total of 318 Davis Tube determinations and XRF concentrate analyses. • A total of 1007 ICP Fusion OES iron ore suite assays. • A total of 699 ARM2 Base Metal / Gold suite assays. Results confirmed the following: • There is potential for a modest iron ore resource at Carrow of between 70 and 90 million tonnes at a bulk grade of 30.8% DTR, 67.67 with better than 67.7% Fe and low impurities. • There is potential for a small resource at Koppio at a bulk grade of 31.37% DTR with 66.94% Fe and 6.19% SiO2, • There is potential for a small resource of very fine-grained magnetite at Iron Mount with a bulk grade of 37.16% DTR, 63.52% Fe and 7.44% SiO2. • No significant base metal or gold results were returned. • A conceptual study indicated that a 3 Mtpa concentrate operation based on a deposit like Carrow could be economic. Mining and power were key costs. Subsequent drilling at Carrow has shown that waste: ore ratio is likely to be significantly higher than the 1: 1 used in the study and that the estimated mining costs would be significantly higher. For the second year of reporting see ENV09473 CNO: 2036115. During Year 3 of reporting, limited fieldwork was carried out by the licensees. Ongoing discussions, meeting and fieldtrip to the area have been undertaken to demonstrate the potential of the Eyre Peninsula region to iron ore investors. detailed study has commenced into the establishment of an iron ore export business of both hematite ore and magnetite concentrates; a processing plant costing about $130m would be required, with export via Whyalla or a new wharf near Cowell. During this reporting period there was a field visit by Peninsula Minerals Matt Wood who collected samples from abandoned tailing dumps. A total of 15 samples were collected from the Lincoln Mine from across 9 abandoned mine workings. Copper results for these samples ranged in value from 0.03% to 30.37% with seven of the mine workings having value greater than 2% copper. Gold results for these samples ranged in value from 0.01 g/t to 2.4g/t Au and silver from less than 1g/t Ag to 35.1 g/t Ag. This result was not enough to do any further field work on their behalf. Peninsula Minerals are no long JV over this tenement, a new agreement is being processed now. No annual report was received for the fourth year of the tenement. During licence Year 6, EL 2887 became a part of the Amalgamated Expenditure Agreement for the Eyre Peninsula Project made between Centrex Metals and Lincoln Minerals. An amalgamated annual report for this period was reported separately [see ENV11450 CNO:2036366]. During the period, 3 RC slimline holes (K06SRC01-03) were drilled for 151 m, 21 drill chip samples were assayed with a single 1 m interval recording weakly anomalous gold, bismuth, tellurium, cobalt and copper.
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