Ground within the northern onshore Saint Vincent Basin was taken up by Iluka Resources to re-appraise the heavy mineral sands (HMS) potential of buried Tertiary sediments there, after some unsuccessful exploration had previously been undertaken in the Balaklava district both by Samedan and by Aberfoyle Resources in the 1980s. But these explorers had not targeted any interpreted palaeo-headland or -embayment features in their past drilling, nor had they investigated regressive raised beach strata at marine highstand levels positioned near the maximum flooding surface limits. Thus the Saint Vincent Basin was regarded by Iluka as still relatively under-explored, despite it having, in one place which has long been mined for its abundant construction sand, a significant known HMS occurrence - the Golden Grove Embayment Eocene mineral sands deposit, containing 26 kt of ilmenite, 39 kt of rutile and 32 kt of zircon. In addition, Iluka knew that the basin is located exceptionally close to infrastructure, which could allow for smaller HMS resources to become economic. During the current period of tenure, licensee Iluka initially undertook regional soil grab sampling of inferred prospective exposed strata in two phases, with the first phase being undertaken in April 2013 on EL 4863 and the second phase in December 2013 on EL 5342, EL 5343 and EL 5344. Soil samples were collected from sandy sediment outcrops seen in road cuttings, creek crossings and drainage lines. The low sampling rate achieved (a total of just 34 samples from 3665 square km) was due to many creek drainage lines being farmed over, leading to poor preservation of Neogene stream sediment profiles. In general the soil profiles observed in the region were thick, and many exposures located in target areas consisted mainly of clayey soil, with only limited sand beds available for sampling. The best results from the creek sampling occurred in Deuce Creek, a well-defined, 5-8 m deep, east-west striking stream valley debouching from the hills south-west of Clare, which contained sands of composition ranging from 2% to 7.4% HM. 12 soil samples returned assay values above 0.5% HM. The HMS occur within a 0.5-1.0 m thick conglomerate unit containing fist-sized boulders of ?Rhynie Sandstone bedrock with HM banding. Adjacent to these boulders, thin 0.5-1.0 cm wide HM bands were commonly observed. Results of a petrographic study of the source metasediment indicated that the HM component of the Rhynie Sandstone consists predominantly of haematite, with some ilmenite mainly being present as alteration lamellae within the haematite. Therefore it was thought that the detrital HM recovered from soil samples collected in the creeks is sourced from the Rhynie Sandstone. A 10 kg bulk stream sediment sample was submitted for microscopic quantitative examination of its heavy mineral content, but it returned an unfavourable mineralogical assemblage description, having virtually no rutile or zircon, and yielding very low Ti assay values. During 2014, Iluka made multiple field reconnaissance trips in preparation for a drilling programme that was completed in early 2015. In January 2015, exploratory aircore traverse drilling was undertaken on EL 4863, targeting interpreted shorelines / trap sites seaward (south-west) of where the anomalous HM had been encountered in creek sediments and overbank soils. 42 vertical open holes were drilled for a total penetration of 1476.5 m, holes being put in at 400 m intervals along two traverses, with some of the holes spread to 800 m apart on the inland ends of each traverse. Marine sands were intersected on drill traverse EBT408 and to a lesser extent on EBT404, along their western ends. The prospective marine sand package appeared to thicken towards the south. At higher RLs along the eastern ends of the drill traverses there are no preserved marine sands or sedimentary evidence of HM accumulation. No significant HM intercepts were reported; the best intersection was made in drillhole SVB025, of 4.5 m @ 0.5% HM from 12 m depth. Information obtained from the 2015 drilling, namely that there is no marine sand preserved at RLs >200 m, was extrapolated by Iluka into its newer project tenements lying to the north and the south of EL 4863. Since the majority of the land within these licences lies at an RL >200 m, they were deemed to be non-prospective for marine placer HM accumulations. It was decided to fully surrender all of the project ground.