Red River Resources Limited (ASX: RVR) announced that it has hit visible gold from the maiden diamond drilling program targeting the Eleanora Garibaldi Lode at its Hillgrove Gold Project in NSW, Australia.
The company said that its Eleanora drill program at Hillgrove Gold Project progressing well. RVR said that gold assays were received from drill holes ELG136, ELG137, and ELG138 with broad intervals of mineralisation intersected.
Red River said that ELG136 intersected 16.6m @ 2.1 g/t Au from 41.4m down hole including 4.0m @ 4.0 g/t Au from 51.0m downhole; while ELG138 intersected 8.6m @ 3.2 g/t Au from 62.4m down hole including 3.7m @ 4.6 g/t Au from 63.7m downhole.
The company said that the drill holes ELG139, ELG140, and ELG141 were completed and dispatched for assay. RVR reported that ELG141 intersected 0.70m of intensely mineralised quartz/siltstone breccia containing coarse grained visible gold, blebby stibnite, and disseminated arsenopyrite from 144.85m downhole.
The company said that the drill rig will move to test Curry’s Lode on Eleanora program completion wherein ELG142, ELG143, and ELG144 are pending to be drilled.
Hillgrove project
The Hillgrove Project is located approximately 30km from Armidale in New South Wales. The Hillgrove site includes a 250ktpa capacity processing plant, an antimony leach/SXEW/refining and casting plant, a gold cyanide leach circuit and gold room, and a pressure oxidation circuit. The site also has a fully HDPE (high-density polyethylene) lined modern tailing storage facility.
The Hillgrove Gold Project has a material high-grade JORC 2012 Compliant Mineral Resource of 5.0Mt @ 4.3 g/t Au and 1.5% Sb (6.4 g/t Au Eq.) (686koz gold and 74kt antimony), in addition to a material high-grade JORC 2004 Compliant Mineral Resource.
The Mineral Resource is contained within 6 key hubs in the Hillgrove Mineral Field. They are Metz Centre; Bakers Creek; Brackins Spur; Eleanora/Garibaldi; Freehold; and Clarks Gully.
Red River had announced a Mineral Resource of 225kt @ 2.5 g/t Au (18koz Au contained) for the Bakers Creek Stockpile.
Maiden diamond drilling program
The company had recently commenced a maiden nine-hole diamond drilling program (ELG136, ELG137, ELG138, ELG139, ELG140, ELG141, ELG142, ELG143, and ELG144) targeting the Eleanora Garibaldi Lode at its Hillgrove Gold Project.
Red River reported that it has now received gold assays for drill holes ELG136, ELG137, and ELG138. The company said that other assays including antimony are still outstanding for these three drill holes, as laboratory turnaround times have increased.
RVR said that drill holes ELG139, ELG140, and ELG141 have been completed and dispatched for assay. The drill hole summary of ELG139, ELG140, and ELG141 are as below.
The company said that the drill holes ELG142, ELG143, and ELG144 remain to be drilled.
High-grade gold intersections
The company announced that the initial drilling at Eleanora has confirmed the presence of the high-grade gold-antimony Eleanora vein system and adjacent halos of low to medium-grade gold mineralisation.
RVR said that two of the three drilled and assayed holes, ELG136 and ELG 138, intersected high-grade gold mineralisation.
The company reported that ELG136 returned 16.6m @ 2.1 g/t Au from 41.4m down hole including 4.0m @ 4.0 g/t Au from 51.0m downhole; and ELG138 returned 8.6m @ 3.2 g/t Au from 62.4m down hole including 3.7m @ 4.6 g/t Au from 63.7m downhole.
RVR said that drill hole ELG141 intersected 0.70m of intensely mineralised quartz/siltstone breccia containing coarse grained visible gold, blebby stibnite & disseminated arsenopyrite from 144.85m downhole.
Drilling confirms potential
The company noted that two large panels of the Eleanora lode were not mined historically. RVR said that these areas represent potential mining fronts close to surface and the existing Hillgrove processing plant.
Red River said that the recent drilling has confirmed the potential to mine these remnant panels to gain access to the deeper Eleanora resources which will be converted from JORC 2004 to JORC 2012 status.
Restart of Hillgrove project
Red River had undertaken a detailed review in preparation for the restart of the Hillgrove Gold Project. The outcome of the review was a lean capital efficient staged restart process.
The company said that the stage One (processing of Bakers Creek Stockpile) is scheduled to commence at the end of CY2020, while the Stage Two (full restart of UG mining operations) is scheduled to commence at the end of CY2021.
Red River said that it will utilise the extensive existing site infrastructure and equipment to deliver a low capital cost restart, with an estimated Stage One capital cost of less than $5m.
What’s next?
The company said that on completion of the current Eleanora drilling program (expected in 8-10 days), the drill rig will move to the Curry’s Block target, to complete a seven-hole (655m) program to follow up Red River’s surface sampling which defined extensive high-grade gold-antimony mineralisation.
The planned Curry’s Block drilling will be partially funded by a grant from the NSW Government New Frontiers Cooperative Drilling Grants Program (Round 3).
The company said that further drilling targeting the Eleanora lode is ongoing.