Lachlan Star (ASX:LSA) is eyeing exploring into the northern area at its latest copper discovery at the Basin Creek prospect, part of the Junee Project in New South Wales, in early 2025.
Speaking to Mining.com.au on the sidelines of the Resources Rising Stars Conference in Queensland yesterday (3 September), Exploration Manager Alan Hawkins says the company is gearing up to drill test the Basin Creek prospect starting in October 2024.
Hawkins says the drilling aims to confirm the interpretation of a “high-grade” shoot.
“Basin Creek has only come about in the last six to eight weeks,” Hawkins tells this news service.
“It has been a bit of a rollercoaster since it got going. We’ll be testing down plunge for the interpretation around the historical drilling and hopefully identify some other areas that have been missed.
“If we confirm the interpretation of the south on historical drilling then going forward into 2025, that is when we will increase the work into the northern area and start building that up.”
On 15 August 2024, the company announced it had uncovered a wide disseminated copper sulphide system at Basin Creek, following conducting a comprehensive relogging of half-a-century-old diamond drill core.
Lachlan Star, which has a market capitalisation of $21.79 million, found several zones of semi-massive-copper sulphides within this system, with historical intercepts up to 18.54% copper.
Hawkins says the company has six holes approved and permitted so far and has all the necessary permits in place.
“Some of the holes are variable. We’ve allowed for about 350m for each hole as a baseline. Some may go shorter and some might go a little deeper. But, we have budgeted for 2,100m of drilling,” he adds.
Meanwhile, Lachlan Star plans to focus further on its flagship North Cobar Project in New South Wales, via reverse circulation drilling.
“That was our initial focus back in February. We went there and we liked it,” Hawkins explains.
“It was the intersection of two major structures. It is un-drill tested again. Previous explorers might have been put off by a bit of shallow cover, but there are no drillholes there.”
The company has drill permitting applications in place and is aiming to receive approvals in the next few weeks.
Once completed drilling at North Cobar, Lachlan Star aims to follow up on Basin Creek.
“The historic drilling is only a very small part of a much larger story,” Hawkins tells this news service.
The southern Junee Project area lies within the Lachlan Fold Belt of central New South Wales.
The region itself hosts more than 110 million ounces of gold and 19 million tonnes of copper in current resource and past production, and also includes the major porphyry copper-gold and epithermal gold deposits of Cadia, Northparkes, and Cowal.
At Basin Creek, a surface copper and base metal geochemical anomaly was discovered in 1972 by Australian Oil and Gas Minerals (AOG). AOG completed diamond drilling over the prospect, defining copper mineralisation within bedrock for over 250m of strike, 150m in width, and to a depth of 200m.
Lachlan Star freshened its board team back in February 2024, with Alan Hawkins appointed as Exploration Manager and Andrew Tyrell as CEO. Hawkins and Tyrell both have more than 20 years experience as a geologist with a proven greenfields exploration background.
As of 30 June 2024, Lachlan Star had $1.6 million cash at hand, according to its latest quarterly report.
Write to Aaliyah Rogan at Mining.com.au
Images: Lachlan Star
