PACE Discovery Drilling (drilling partnerships with DSD and industry): Year 8 partnership DPY8-31 - Peterlumbo Hill area, Eyre Peninsula, skarn and/or porphyry type Mesoproterozoic epithermal Cu-Au and Ag-base metal prospects. Drilling final report.
Published: 20 Jan 1916 Created: 12 Nov 2024 Revised: 12 Nov 2024

Investigator Resources (IVR) applied on 30/1/2015 to participate in the PACE Initiative Year 8 (2015) collaborative drilling grant program between industry and government being administered by DSD. The application for subsidy funds submitted by...

Investigator Resources (IVR) applied on 30/1/2015 to participate in the PACE Initiative Year 8 (2015) collaborative drilling grant program between industry and government being administered by DSD. The application for subsidy funds submitted by IVR was focussed on three core areas within its 583 square km EL 5368 Peterlumbo Hill area, chosen on the basis of modelling of previous exploration data. This had generated five buried targets, the drilling of which could uncover potentially new styles and types of mineralisation that may have formed around the 2011 Paris silver discovery, within the greater southern Gawler Range Volcanics Domain. IVR is lately taking a minerals system approach to its exploration. This hypothesises that there are larger silver deposits and distal to proximal alteration mineral zoning which point towards possible buried skarn and porphyry copper-gold deposits developed within the 10 km x 20 km Paris-Nankivel mineral system, positioned along the NW–SE structural axis which passes through the key Argos, Paris, Nankivel, Peterlumbo Hill and Hector prospects. To facilitate understanding this model and to progress its study of target vectoring within the system, IVR has collected an extensive dataset of surface mapping observations, soil geochemical data, magnetic data, IP data, and subsurface information gained from pattern scout drilling and logging, plus, with the assistance of the Department of State Development, HyMap hyperspectral remote sensing data, VTEM airborne survey data, drill core and cuttings Hylogger mineral spectral data, and geochemical dispersion data from geobotanical sampling trials conducted around the Paris deposit. Targets selected for drilling under the approved DPY8-31 exploration assistance proposal included the Nankivel Intrusive Complex in the vicinity of the Paris Inferred Resource, which was initially targeted to assess potential skarn and blind porphyry style alteration/mineralisation. Magnetic features adjacent to the outcropping Warrow Quartzite at Peterlumbo Hill were also targeted with the objective of assessing whether modelled potential porphyry style mineralisation might be present. The third target was a copper in soil anomaly over a drainage channel at the southern end of the Hector prospect, where early Paris Project aircore drilling had identified elevated cerium and lanthanum anomalism; testing of the bedrock at a nearby locality was warranted to try to determine the anomalies' source and to assess any alteration. A total of 19 vertical or steeply inclined RC holes were drilled during July 2015 for a total penetration of 3516 m. Of these, 16 holes were drilled in and around the Nankivel Intrusive Complex, two holes were drilled at Peterlumbo and one abandoned hole was put in at Hector. The PACE-assisted drilling successfully demonstrated that the Nankivel Intrusive Complex rocks appear to be of variable compositions which are permissive for a porphyry system, i.e. ranging from granodiorite to quartz monzodiorite to monzonite, with potassic alteration and variable magnetite alteration. Additional holes put in subsequently on the margins of these intrusions encountered possible skarn mineralisation, with patchy occurrences of anomalous copper, zinc and lead plus up to 10% pyrite identified where the complex appears to intrude amphibolite facies mafic metasediments. Additional RC drilling was undertaken on interpreted structures emanating from the Nankivel Intrusive Complex, and in places where a strong gravity contrast exists with the responses seen at the margins of the intrusions. This drilling encountered previously unseen rock types (pyroxene hornfels, quartz-clinopyroxene metacalc-silicates) as well as broader expanses of carbonaceous metapelites, all affected by variable to pervasive phyllic alteration. Strong zinc anomalism is associated with holes that may lie in close proximity to granites in the Helen West area; those granites have similar features to others recorded at Peterlumbo Hill, and are similarly worthy of further investigation. At Helen West, hole PPRC356 hit broad zones of zinc anomalism within limonitic saprolite clays over an aggregate 60 m, including intervals of 20 m @ 1933 ppm Zn [41-61 m] and 26 m @ 3706 ppm Zn [63-89 m], as well as a number of thin shallower intercepts. This hole was sited along a north-west trending magnetic lineament which crosses the Nankivel Hill intrusive complex. Around 4 km distant to the east, hole PPRC359 sited on the south-western side of the Peterlumbo Hill magnetic anomaly found significant zinc and lead anomalism over an aggregate 32 m in a similar saprolitic clay unit; here the highest assay values included 13 m @ 0.2% Pb, 15 m @ 0.38% Zn [194-209 m], 5 m @ 1.15% Zn [213-218 m] and 8 m @ 0.36% Zn [220-228 m], with mineralisation remaining open at depth owing to abandonment of the drillhole at 228 m due to the sticky ground conditions. The limited PACE RC drilling carried out at Peterlumbo Hill revealed a new type of intrusion, described by the consultant petrologist as a porphyritic micromonzonite. This unit is of unknown age, but its compositional similarity to rocks of the Nankivel Intrusive Complex lends credence to the idea that a second, likely related intrusive complex may underlie the Warrow Quartzite at Peterlumbo Hill : this may account for the rather unusual spectral signature noted in HyMap satellite imagery recorded at this locality. The recognition of this additional intrusive unit may support an expectation of wider spread skarn style mineralisation or of finding a potential buried porphyry system. IVR has already discerned that this possible porphyry target area is accompanied by anomalous zinc mineralisation on its margins. The single drill test of the Hector copper anomaly target, looking for evidence of another possible porphyry system that may have developed along the prospective NW-SE trending Paris-Nankivel basement structure, proved to be unsuccessful owing to the inability of the RC percussion drill method to penetrate overlying loose sands within the drainage channel. Abrasive wear to drill rig componentry, combined with the risk of total collapse of the hole, forced its abandonment. IVR has concluded that the results obtained from its DPY8-21 drilling campaign have greatly enhanced the potential for discovering buried skarn and porphyry copper mineralisation under Nankivel Hill. This perceived increased prospectivity has encouraged the company to negotiate for improved on-ground exploration access to drill more widely within the Nankivel Hill region, through the conduct of repeat clearance surveys of Aboriginal heritage concerns. The result of this approach has been that the majority of the company's high priority copper targets have now been cleared for drilling in 2016.

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About this record

Record No mesac27182
Topic Geoscientific Information
Type of Resource Document
Category Type
Document Type Mineral Company Report - Mineral Exploration
Contributor Mason Geoscience Pty Ltd
Sponsor
Tenement
Tenement Holder Sunthe Uranium Pty Ltd
Operator Investigator Resources Limited
Geological Province
Mine Name Nankivel prospect;Hector prospect;Helen West prospect
Stratigraphy Hutchison Group
Commodity
Notes
Notes: PACE project code DPY8-31 : company final submission includes exploration drilling actual total cost ($216,252.52 excluding Goods and Services Tax), out of which PACE Initiative funds have paid $100,000.00 (excl. GST).
Geographic Locality:...

Notes: PACE project code DPY8-31 : company final submission includes exploration drilling actual total cost ($216,252.52 excluding Goods and Services Tax), out of which PACE Initiative funds have paid $100,000.00 (excl. GST). Geographic Locality: Southern Gawler Ranges;Peterlumbo Hill;Nankivel Hill;Uno Fault Doc No: Env 12976 Drillhole: PPRC345 - PPRC362;(290988 - 291006)

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Language English
Metadata Standard ISO 19115-3

Citations

Use constraints License
License Creative Commons Attribution 4.0
Persistent identifier https://pid.sarig.sa.gov.au/document/mesac27182
Citation Murray, J.;Alesci, A.;Anderson, J.C.;Mason, D.R. 1916. PACE Discovery Drilling (drilling partnerships with DSD and industry): Year 8 partnership DPY8-31 - Peterlumbo Hill area, Eyre Peninsula, skarn and/or porphyry type Mesoproterozoic epithermal Cu-Au and Ag-base metal prospects. Drilling final report. Mineral Company Report - Mineral Exploration
https://pid.sarig.sa.gov.au/document/mesac27182

Technical information

Status
Maintenance and Update Frequency
Geographic Reference GDA2020 (EPSG:7844)
Geo bounding box {"type":"Polygon","coordinates":[[[135.5,-33],[136.5,-33],[136.5,-32.5],[135.5,-32.5],[135.5,-33]]]}
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Lineage