Western Mines delivers massive 5.3Mt WA contained | Australian Markets

Western Mines Group has delivered an eye-watering 5.3 million tonnes of contained sulphide-hosted nickel within the company’s maiden mineral useful resource for its flagship Mulga Tank nickel project, 190 kilometres northeast of Kalgoorlie.

The company believes the Mulga Tank useful resource is one of Australia’s greatest nickel sulphide deposits and will put the project within the league of the world’s Top 10 nickel deposits.

The beautiful, globally important useful resource in WA’s Eastern Goldfields additionally accommodates 257,000t of cobalt, 161,000t of copper and 1.1M ounces of mixed platinum and palladium.

At a 0.20 per cent nickel cut-off, the indicated useful resource is estimated at 565Mt at 0.28 per cent nickel, 134 components per million (ppm) cobalt, 104ppm copper and 18 components per billion (ppb) mixed platinum and palladium.

An further inferred useful resource is estimated at 1403Mt at 0.27 per cent nickel, 129ppm cobalt, 73ppm copper and 17ppb mixed platinum and palladium.

With these numbers, complete assets now stand at 1968Mt at 0.27 per nickel, 131ppm cobalt, 82ppm copper and 17ppb mixed platinum and palladium, inserting Mulga Tank a minimum of thrice greater than Australia’s different big-name contained nickel deposits.

It dwarfs BHP Billiton’s Yakabindie nickel deposit, 22km south of Mt Keith close to Wiluna, which has a 289Mt estimated useful resource of 0.58 per cent nickel that interprets to 1.7Mt of nickel metallic.

Adding to the upside, the just about 2 billion tonne Mulga Tank useful resource is derived solely from the shallow disseminated nickel sulphide mineralised zone within the centre of the complicated’s predominant physique, which might doubtlessly be mined from an open pit.

This is a very important milestone for the project. Our exploration outcomes from Mulga Tank and this mineral useful resource estimate reveal what we have now long said – that the principle physique of the complicated hosts a globally important nickel sulphide deposit, we imagine the biggest nickel sulphide deposit in Australia and among the many high 10 within the world. The useful resource estimate focuses on simply the shallow disseminated mineralisation in what could possibly be a massive open pit state of affairs. We’ve acquired more than enough tonnes, and it’ll get greater as we prolong in a quantity of instructions.

WMG’s useful resource estimate model is constrained within the depth and lateral extent of the company’s increased density space of drilling within the disseminated zone.

Additional intensive shallow disseminated mineralisation has already been outlined laterally in more open areas of drilling that aren’t included within the useful resource estimate.

The company has drilled the centre of the exceptional Mulga Tank intrusive physique with a mixture of diamond and reverse circulation drill rigs.

The reverse circulation program was usually used to infill and develop the shallow disseminated nickel sulphide mineralisation.

Seven diamond drill holes have been used to validate the grade, geology and mineralisation fashion of some reverse circulation holes and to probe deeper so far as the basal contact of the dunite host physique to find out the extent of the massive nickel sulphide mineralisation that underlies the disseminated zone.

The company’s diamond drilling program is ongoing to guage deeper targets for basal massive nickel sulphides.

Mulga Tank appears to be like virtually sure to reward additional extension, infill and deep drill applications in each the shallow disseminated and massive sulphide.

A fast eyeballing of the lateral and vertical extents of the Mulga Tank drilling and the extent and considerably increased grade of its underlying massive nickel sulphides even factors to the potential of doubling the present nickel metallic tonnage.

So a lot of the instant space justifies extensional and infill drill testing that WMG won’t be able to accommodate it all of sudden.

Given the present scale and shallow depth of the useful resource estimate and the potential to maneuver to early open pit mining of the useful resource, WMG’s short-term focus will likely be on defining cohesive zones of increased grade materials within its current model.

These embrace a number of zones with grades of up to 4.5 per cent nickel and 4.8 per cent copper.

This main milestone for the company is the end result of more than three years of work since its ASX itemizing, during which it has drilled 18 diamond holes for 13,446m, 63 reverse circulation holes for slightly below 20,000m, assayed 20,330 samples and brought more than 24,000 core analyses by moveable XRF.

The massive endeavor was accompanied by downhole and transferring loop electromagnetic geophysics, ground-based gravity and airborne cellular magneto-telluric surveys.

WMG additionally included 12 earlier diamond holes drilled by third events in its database, which have been used to offer further geological knowledge however have been excluded from the geochemical database used for its modelling.

WMG’s modelling and mineral useful resource estimate has been reviewed by unbiased consultants ERM Australia Consultants and contains all of the company’s drill outcomes to the top of February.

The modelled space of curiosity was subdivided into three distinct geological domains. These embrace the uppermost zone of about 70m of latest sand cowl on high of the ultramafic complicated, and a second skinny oxidised zone between the sand cowl and the underlying dunite area.

The deepest dunite area includes disseminated sulphide mineralisation which extends to more than 400m beneath floor.

The predominant dunite intrusive displays intensive intercumulus sulphide blebs, primarily of nickel sulphide mineral pentlandite, that are thought-about typical of Type-2 nickel sulphide systems, resembling on the Mt Keith deposit.

Drilling additionally encountered intersections of high nickel-tenor massive sulphide veins much less than 20cm thick and immiscible sulphide globules which, mixed with the intercumulus sulphides, level to Mulga Tank being a hybrid system, which options separate mechanisms of sulphide precipitation and gravity settling.

WMG believes this hybridism, which supplies for important basal accumulations of massive and matrix sulphides, considerably will increase the system’s prospectivity.

Mulga Tank has all the time appeared like a reward that retains on giving because the drill outcomes got here rolling in.

WMG believes the big, low-grade useful resource can be best exploited by a large-scale operation benefiting from its appreciable economies of scale.

Comparing Mulga Tank with comparable massive low-grade gold and base metallic tasks, WMG envisages a trendy, massive, open pit operation to mine and course of between about 30Mt and 40Mt per 12 months of ore.

The company’s subsequent steps will likely be fascinating to watch. For instance, the prospect of a 3km long by 2km vast open pit in disseminated nickel to about 400m beneath floor can be one thing to see. And it could possibly be just the start.

Is your ASX-listed company doing one thing attention-grabbing? Contact: [email protected]