Western Star Resources (CSE:WSR) has confirmed three extensive historical tungsten workings at the Rowland Project in Nevada, after completing a phase one exploration program.
The phase one program comprises a high-resolution unmanned aerial vehicle magnetic geophysical survey, focused soil geochemistry, rock chip sampling, and field checking of historical workings. Samples have been submitted to the laboratory with rush processing requested in order to return assay results as quickly as possible.
Four discrete zones were identified, all hosted within the same skarn-style geological setting as the originally targeted Rowland workings.
Western Star expects to finalise the second phase of exploration and advance toward drill targeting and permitting as soon as possible.
CEO Blake Morgan says Rowland has come out of phase one looking “considerably more prospective” than historical records suggested.
“We expected a single past-producing zone; the field crew came back with multiple zones of extensive historical development, including a previously undocumented central area with processing infrastructure, shafts, and 600–700m of trenching,” Morgan says.
“We adjusted the program in real time to focus on what was actually on the ground and have rush-submitted the first round of rock and soil samples so we can get assays back as quickly as possible.”
Rowland’s zones
The Northern Zone A is the area that prompted Western Star’s prior expansion of the Rowland claim package.
Desktop work uncovered the area as historically mapped as a single adit. However, the surrounding waste dumps and surface piles are substantially larger and more extensive than the historical record indicates, suggesting that a meaningful volume of historical material was mined and processed from this area.
The Northern Zone B is considered the ‘most significant’ historical development confirmed during the program. The zone was not documented in publicly available historical production records.
Western Star’s field crew has confirmed the suspected shafts, with three to four observed in the field.
The Rowland Zone, the original target of the property, has multiple additional workings, trenches, and surface disturbances up and down the slope around the previously known features. Western Star says this materially increases the inventory of confirmed historical workings within the area.
Western Star is a mineral explorer which owns nine non-surveyed contiguous mineral claims totalling 4,740 hectares in British Columbia.
Write to Aaliyah Rogan at Mining.com.au
Images: Western Star Resources
