Aureka (ASX:AKA) has delivered a record intercept of 0.3m @ 109 grams per tonne gold from 117.2m at the St Arnaud-Comstock Project in Victoria, via a diamond drilling program.
Managing Director James Gurry says this intercept highlights the potential for the exploration target to grow the resource and supports the possibility of a future pathway to near-term production.
“Once again, it is great to report record high gold intercepts across our project portfolio,” Gurry says.
The 109g/t gold intercept highlights the potential for the exploration target to grow the JORC resource and support the possibility of a future pathway to near-term production, he adds.
In September 2025, the Victoria-focused gold explorer completed a 2,253m diamond drilling program.
Mineralised intercepts in three holes are associated with the steeply west dipping Comstock Shear. All of the intercepts are beyond the current resource boundary, extending known mineralisation by up to 100m.
Hole 25NED002 returned 1m @ 65.37g/t gold from 116.2m, including 0.4m @ 65.4g/t gold from 116.2m and the record intercept of 109g/t gold.
The other latest results include 10.04m @ 1.58g/t gold from 189.68m and 15.39m @ 0.63g/t gold from 202.5m.
The gold mineralisation intercepts are outside the maiden mineral resource and within the exploration target, and “demonstrates the ongoing potential for the Comstock Project to deliver resource growth with the possibility of a higher-grade lode component within”.
The Comstock Shear intersections reported are all represented by a 30-50-metre-wide shear zone with multiple faults. Sulphide concentration and gold grades are observed to increase closer to laminated, brecciated and massive quartz faults.
Visible gold of 25NED002 was logged within massive quartz veins with minor stylites and associated tension veins.
As previously reported, Aureka says future drill programs at Comstock will aim to target additional down dip and down plunge extensions of the Comstock reef system, as well as expand upon the inferred resource.
In June 2025, Aureka released a maiden JORC mineral resource estimate of 1.45 million tonnes at 1.21g/t gold for 56,500 ounces of gold. Additionally, an exploration target around the inferred resource has been estimated to range between 3 million tonnes and 3.5 million tonnes, at grades 1-1.2g/t resulting in an exploration target range estimate of 112,000 ounces to 116,000 ounces of gold and potentially economic amounts of silver at a grades of 1.9g/t to 2.02g/t for total of 195,000 ounces to 214,000 ounces of silver.
The Comstock prospect sits on the eastern margin of the Stawell Geological zone of the Lachlan Orogen within the Saint Arnaud Group metasediments, which are unfossiliferous, quartz rich turbidites assumed to be Cambro-Ordovician in age.
Comstock is located within the historical St Arnaud Goldfields along the Nelson line of reef and is situated some 2km north of the township of St Arnaud. Locally, the geology of the Comstock project consists of a package of tightly folded turbidites with distinct shale and sandstone layers of varying thicknesses.
The area is dominated by a north-northwest trending, west dipping fault/shear zone known as the Comstock Shear. The shear zone is interpreted to lie within the hinge zone of a large-scale syncline and is confined by a wide, shale dominant zone of sediments. Shale directly adjacent to the shear zone tends to be highly carbonaceous and very dark grey to black in colour.
Coarse euhedral pyrite crystals seem to be syngenetic to this carbon rich zone of fine sediments, quartz veining is associated with gold mineralisation and is massive to stylolitic in texture.
Primary gold mineralisation at St Arnaud is hosted within quartz veins, which are structurally controlled within very complex structural domains associated with folding and north-northwest trending, west dipping thrust faults.
Gold mineralisation is hosted by quartz reef systems within brittle fractures and faults and can extend from a few metres long to a few kilometres along strike but usually a few hundred metres.
Write to Aaliyah Rogan at Mining.com.au
Images: Aureka
