Pivotal Metals (ASX:PVT) has identified “material resource growth potential” at its Horden Lake deposit with drilling showing thicker copper mineralisation at depth.
The Canada-focused critical minerals explorer has received the results of three further holes from step out drilling that returned 32.1m @ 1.2% copper equivalent from 264.3m.
This included a higher grade interval of 14.2m @ 1.79% copper equivalent from 275.9m.
Pivotal says this is the deepest hole in this zone, 70-90m diagonally down-plunge from the two nearest historic holes, and representing a “substantially” wider copper zone.
Managing Director Ivan Fairhall says the latest drill results, coupled with very strong downhole electromagnetic (DHEM) conductors, indicate the mineralisation has continuity along strike and clearly extends at depth.
The HN-24-98 plate indicates a highly conductive mineralised zone is skewed below the hole, extending 225m down-plunge.
Drilling has already defined continuity 270m up-plunge, Pivotal says.
Meanwhile, the HN-24-96 stacked plates indicate the hole hit the edge of a “strongly mineralised” zone which sits deeper and to the north of previously reported intercepts of 17.1m @ 0.58% copper equivalent and 11.9m @ 1.39% copper equivalent.
These first two plates link over 300m of strike extent which remains open down-plunge.
“These results show clearly the tremendous potential for Horden Lake to deliver substantial exploration upside, with hole 98 showing the copper zone expanding at depth with one of the best intersections on the project,” Fairhall says.
“It is important to highlight that drilling has defined high grade mineralisation to over 550m in the central zone (and still open), and we now see no reason why the southern zone cannot achieve a similar, or possibly better, result.”
Economic resources at the central zone are around 50% to 60% deeper than currently defined in the south.
Only about 30% of the strike length has been drilled below 220m. The deeper area hosts around 30% of the current indicated and inferred JORC-compliant resource of 28 million tonnes at 1.5% copper equivalent.
Shallow infill drilling, meanwhile, has returned an interval of 33.8m @ 0.81% copper equivalent from 38m.
Pivotal says the results highlight the “significant” gold, silver, platinum group metals and cobalt byproducts never previously assayed and demonstrates the continuity of the wide zone of shallow open-pittable copper mineralisation.
Horden Lake is a copper-nickel-gold-platinum group metals-cobalt project that sits 131km north-northwest of Matagami, in Québec.
Over 52,464m of drilling has been completed on Horden Lake. Pivotal recently completed 7,097m of diamond drilling across 34 holes.
Assays from 25 holes remain pending, including multiple step-out and DHEM results across zones of open mineralisation.
Write to Angela East at Mining.com.au
Images: Pivotal Metals
