Multiple Strong MLEM Conductors Detected at Stairy
TORONTO, June 16, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Xanadu Mines Ltd (ASX: XAM, TSX: XAM) (“Xanadu” or “the Company”) is pleased to announce that preliminary Moving-Loop Electromagnetic data from the Red Mountain joint venture with the Japan Oil, Gas and Metals National Corporation (JOGMEC JV) copper-gold project (Figures 1 and 2), has identified multiple highly prospective drill targets.
Highlights
- First-pass ground Moving Loop Electromagnetic (MLEM) survey completed at the Stairy prospect
- Cluster of moderate to high, mid to late-time bedrock Electromagnetic (EM) conductors defined
- Several extensive Cu anomalies proximal to and coincident with these new EM conductors
- Numerous new targets identifying for trenching and drilling
- Results highlight the potential for the discovery to expand considerably along strike from the high-grade intercept reported on the 22nd of March
- Additional ground EM surveys underway
- Trenching planned to commence immediately; and diamond drilling planned to commence mid-July
Xanadu’s Chief Executive Officer, Dr Andrew Stewart, said “This is an exciting and important development for the Red Mountain JOGMEC JV project. Whilst it is still early days, we are very encouraged that the first phase of MLEM survey at the Stairy prospect has identified numerous conductive anomalies in the target area. The identification of numerous conductors’ co-incident with broad geochemical anomalism in historical trenches and where high-grade massive sulphide mineralisation has been intersected in drilling is encouraging. We consider Stairy to be analogous to the other massive sulphide/lode copper vein deposits where very high-grade copper occurs in structures above a larger porphyry system. Trenching will commence immediately, and we anticipate diamond drilling to commence mid-July.”
FIGURE 1: Location of the Red Mountain JOGMEC JV Project in the South Gobi porphyry copper belt is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/3485efe9-b358-4f0c-9047-6b4f91e10ec6
FIGURE 2: The Red Mountain Mining Licence showing ground Landsat data and location of the priority targets is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/be6a9b7d-d8ba-4e7f-aa13-ff3694b715de
Stairy Previous Exploration
The Stairy prospect consists of a 1.5km by 1km zone of sheeted mineralised structures hosted within the Stairy Intrusive in the central east of the Red Mountain Mining Lease. These structures are interpreted to be sub-vertical, up to twenty-four meters wide and can extend for over a kilometre. Copper mineralisation at Stairy consists of massive bornite and chalcopyrite sulphide with quartz carbonate fill. The current geological interpretations suggest these sheeted structures may be linked to a large-scale porphyry system at depth.
Recent drilling at Stairy (please see ASX/TSX Announcement dated 22 March 2021) returned significant shallow high-grade copper with OUDDH100 returning 16m @ 4.09% Cu from 54m, including 4m @ 15.89% Cu from 55m (Figure 3).
Prior to Xanadu exploring at Red Mountain, several companies conducted trenching at Stairy. Previous explorers worked at Red Mountain between 2001 and 2007 and completed 6,274m of trenching at Stairy in 2005. Key historical intercepts from these previous companies trenching at Stairy include;
OUT001 | 16m @ 0.98% Cu and 0.17g/t Au (1.07% eCu) from 266m |
Including | 6m @ 2.27% Cu and 0.44g/t Au (2.49% eCu) from 276m |
And | 56m @ 1.02% Cu and 0.02g/t Au (1.03% eCu) from 518m |
Including | 12m @ 4.07% Cu and 0.08g/t Au (4.11% eCu) from 542m |
OUT002 | 6m @ 3.85% Cu and 0.24g/t Au (3.97% eCu) from 490m |
OUT008 | 6m @ 2.61% Cu and 0.10g/t Au (2.65% eCu) from 280m |
A full review of the previous company exploration has been conducted for Stairy and a summary of the historical (previous company) intercepts above 0.5% Cu are presented in Table 1.
Stairy Future Exploration
The massive sulphide lenses that occur at Stairy are likely to be visible to MLEM. A detailed MLEM survey has commenced at Stairy, designed to map the structures that contain the most significant accumulations of massive sulphide. The survey is split into two areas, a northern area and a southern area. Data from the northern area has been received and preliminary results can be seen in Figure 4. These preliminary results show moderate to strong EM responses in the late time channels for known lenses of massive sulphide, but more importantly show numerous stronger responses in along strike from known lenses in areas untested by trenching or drilling. This data will focus the planned trenching scheduled to start in a weeks’ time. Drilling will commence in mid-July on completion of trenching. Approximately 2,400m of diamond drilling is planned for Stairy.
FIGURE 3: The Stairy Prospect with drill hole OUDDH100, section and plan and historic trench results is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/88465c8a-608b-4383-826f-5ac748baa431
FIGURE 4: Preliminary MLEM data over the northern area of Stairy. Channels 15 to 27 Tau is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/ab84f737-704f-477f-9db1-538e54587d1d
About Red Mountain
The Red Mountain JOGMEC JV project located within the Dornogovi Province of southern Mongolia, approximately 420 kilometres southeast of Ulaanbaatar (Figure 1), is a joint venture between Xanadu and JOGMEC. The project covers approximately 57 square kilometres in a frontier terrane with significant mineral endowment and has a granted 30-year mining licence. Red Mountain comprises a cluster of outcropping mineralising porphyry intrusions which display features typically found in the shallower parts of porphyry systems where narrow dykes and patchy mineralisation branch out above a mineralised stock. This underexplored porphyry district includes multiple porphyry copper-gold centres, mineralised tourmaline breccia pipes copper-gold/base metal skarns and high-grade epithermal gold veins.
Joint Venture with JOGMEC
JOGMEC may earn up to 51% beneficial interest in the project by sole funding up to $US7.2 million in exploration expenditure over the next 4 years. Exploration objectives of the earn-in deal are to discover Mongolia’s next world-class copper-porphyry deposit.
About Xanadu Mines
Xanadu is an ASX and TSX listed Exploration company operating in Mongolia. We give investors exposure to globally significant, large scale copper-gold discoveries and low-cost inventory growth. Xanadu maintains a portfolio of exploration projects and remains one of the few junior explorers on the ASX or TSX who control an emerging Tier 1 copper-gold deposit in our flagship Kharmagtai project. For information on Xanadu visit: www.xanadumines.com.
For further information, please contact:
Andrew Stewart
Chief Executive Officer
T: +61 2 8280 7497
M: +61 409 819 922
E: [email protected]
This Announcement was authorised for release by Xanadu’s Board of Directors.
Appendix 1: Drilling Results
Table 1: Historic trench results
Hole ID | Prospect | From (m) | To (m) | Interval (m) | Au (g/t) | Cu (%) | CuEq (%) | AuEq (g/t) |
OUT001 | Stairy | 266 | 282 | 16 | 0.17 | 0.98 | 1.07 | 2.09 |
including | 276 | 282 | 6 | 0.44 | 2.27 | 2.49 | 4.87 | |
and | 518 | 574 | 56 | 0.02 | 1.02 | 1.03 | 2.02 | |
including | 538 | 554 | 16 | 0.06 | 3.2 | 3.23 | 6.32 | |
including | 542 | 554 | 12 | 0.08 | 4.07 | 4.11 | 8.04 | |
and | 660 | 678 | 18 | 0.13 | 0.88 | 0.95 | 1.85 | |
including | 660 | 666 | 6 | 0.34 | 2.27 | 2.45 | 4.78 | |
including | 802 | 808 | 6 | 0.2 | 0.95 | 1.05 | 2.05 | |
including | 804 | 808 | 4 | 0.27 | 1.24 | 1.37 | 2.68 | |
OUT002 | Stairy | 228 | 234 | 6 | 0.16 | 1.28 | 1.36 | 2.67 |
and | 418 | 428 | 10 | 0.02 | 0.51 | 0.52 | 1.02 | |
including | 418 | 422 | 4 | 0.03 | 1.02 | 1.03 | 2.02 | |
and | 490 | 496 | 6 | 0.24 | 3.85 | 3.97 | 7.77 | |
and | 618 | 622 | 4 | 0.02 | 1.28 | 1.29 | 2.53 | |
and | 662 | 668 | 6 | 0.02 | 1.16 | 1.17 | 2.28 | |
OUT003 | Stairy | 288 | 320 | 32 | 0.03 | 0.59 | 0.61 | 1.19 |
and | 352 | 356 | 4 | 0.04 | 1.35 | 1.37 | 2.67 | |
OUT004 | Stairy | 52 | 66 | 14 | 0.01 | 0.66 | 0.66 | 1.3 |
including | 54 | 66 | 12 | 0.01 | 0.75 | 0.75 | 1.47 | |
and | 406 | 410 | 4 | 0.04 | 0.71 | 0.72 | 1.42 | |
and | 422 | 442 | 20 | 0.06 | 0.56 | 0.59 | 1.16 | |
including | 422 | 436 | 14 | 0.05 | 0.77 | 0.8 | 1.56 | |
OUT005 | Stairy | 362 | 366 | 4 | 0.08 | 1.52 | 1.56 | 3.05 |
OUT006 | Stairy | 258 | 298 | 40 | 0.04 | 0.63 | 0.64 | 1.26 |
including | 266 | 284 | 18 | 0.06 | 1.27 | 1.3 | 2.54 | |
including | 266 | 282 | 16 | 0.06 | 1.35 | 1.38 | 2.71 | |
OUT007 | Stairy | 368 | 372 | 4 | 0.01 | 0.91 | 0.92 | 1.79 |
OUT008 | Stairy | 78 | 92 | 14 | 0.02 | 0.5 | 0.51 | 0.99 |
including | 78 | 86 | 8 | 0.01 | 0.62 | 0.63 | 1.23 | |
and | 140 | 144 | 4 | 0.1 | 0.6 | 0.65 | 1.26 | |
and | 276 | 302 | 26 | 0.03 | 0.68 | 0.69 | 1.35 | |
including | 280 | 286 | 6 | 0.1 | 2.61 | 2.65 | 5.19 | |
OUT010 | Stairy | 32 | 40 | 8 | 0.01 | 0.54 | 0.54 | 1.06 |
OUT011 | Stairy | 102 | 106 | 4 | 0.01 | 0.54 | 0.54 | 1.07 |
OUXT001 | Stairy | 25.7 | 32 | 6.3 | 0.04 | 1 | 1.02 | 1.99 |
OUXT001A | Stairy | 5 | 20.6 | 15.6 | 0.01 | 0.53 | 0.53 | 1.04 |
including | 5 | 12.9 | 7.9 | 0.02 | 0.9 | 0.91 | 1.77 | |
OUXT002 | Stairy | 43.1 | 51.1 | 8 | 0.05 | 0.95 | 0.98 | 1.91 |
including | 45 | 51.1 | 6.1 | 0.04 | 1.1 | 1.12 | 2.2 | |
including | 68.9 | 75 | 6.1 | 0.02 | 0.59 | 0.6 | 1.17 | |
OUXT003 | Stairy | 2.7 | 12 | 9.3 | 0.04 | 0.57 | 0.59 | 1.15 |
STR-10-03 | Stairy | 2 | 20 | 18 | 0.14 | 0.79 | 0.86 | 1.68 |
Including | 2 | 18 | 16 | 0.15 | 0.86 | 0.94 | 1.83 | |
and | 116 | 122 | 6 | 0.14 | 0.98 | 1.06 | 2.07 |
Appendix 2: Statements and Disclaimers
Competent Person Statement
The information in this announcement that relates to exploration results is based on information compiled by Dr Andrew Stewart, who is responsible for the exploration data, comments on exploration target sizes, QA/QC and geological interpretation and information. Dr Stewart, who is an employee of Xanadu and is a Member of the Australasian Institute of Geoscientists, has sufficient experience relevant to the style of mineralisation and type of deposit under consideration and to the activity he is undertaking to qualify as the “Competent Person” as defined in the 2012 Edition of the Australasian Code for Reporting Exploration Results, Mineral Resources and Ore Reserves and the National Instrument 43-101. Dr Stewart consents to the inclusion in the report of the matters based on this information in the form and context in which it appears.
Copper Equivalent Calculations
The copper equivalent (eCu) calculation represents the total metal value for each metal, multiplied by the conversion factor, summed and expressed in equivalent copper percentage with a metallurgical recovery factor applied. The copper equivalent calculation used is based off the eCu calculation defined by CSA in the 2018 Mineral Resource Upgrade.
Copper equivalent (eCu) grade values were calculated using the following formula:
eCu = Cu + Au * 0.62097 * 0.8235,
Where Cu = copper grade (%); Au = gold grade (gold per tonne (g/t)); 0.62097 = conversion factor (gold to copper); and 0.8235 = relative recovery of gold to copper (82.35%).
The copper equivalent formula was based on the following parameters (prices are in USD): Copper price = 3.1 $/lb (or 6,834 $ per tonne ($/t)); Gold price = 1,320 $ per ounce ($/oz); Copper recovery = 85%; Gold recovery = 70%; and Relative recovery of gold to copper = 70% / 85% = 82.35%.
Forward-Looking Statements
Certain statements contained in this Announcement, including information as to the future financial or operating performance of Xanadu and its projects may also include statements which are ‘forward‐looking statements’ that may include, amongst other things, statements regarding targets, estimates and assumptions in respect of mineral reserves and mineral resources and anticipated grades and recovery rates, production and prices, recovery costs and results, capital expenditures and are or may be based on assumptions and estimates related to future technical, economic, market, political, social and other conditions. These ‘forward-looking statements’ are necessarily based upon a number of estimates and assumptions that, while considered reasonable by Xanadu, are inherently subject to significant technical, business, economic, competitive, political and social uncertainties and contingencies and involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual events or results to differ materially from estimated or anticipated events or results reflected in such forward‐looking statements.
Xanadu disclaims any intent or obligation to update publicly or release any revisions to any forward‐looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events, circumstances or results or otherwise after the date of this Announcement or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events, other than required by the Corporations Act 2001 (Cth) and the Listing Rules of the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) and Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX). The words ‘believe’, ‘expect’, ‘anticipate’, ‘indicate’, ‘contemplate’, ‘target’, ‘plan’, ‘intends’, ‘continue’, ‘budget’, ‘estimate’, ‘may’, ‘will’, ‘schedule’ and similar expressions identify forward‐looking statements.
All ‘forward‐looking statements’ made in this Announcement are qualified by the foregoing cautionary statements. Investors are cautioned that ‘forward‐looking statements’ are not guarantee of future performance and accordingly investors are cautioned not to put undue reliance on ‘forward‐looking statements’ due to the inherent uncertainty therein.
For further information please visit the Xanadu Mines’ Website at www.xanadumines.com.
Appendix 3: Red Mountain Table 1 (JORC 2012)
Set out below is Section 1 and Section 2 of Table 1 under the JORC Code, 2012 Edition for the Red Mountain project. Data provided by Xanadu. This Table 1 updates the JORC Table 1 disclosure dated 18 September 2017.
1.1 JORC TABLE 1 - SECTION 1 - SAMPLING TECHNIQUES AND DATA
Criteria | JORC Code explanation | Commentary |
Sampling techniques |
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Drilling techniques |
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Drill sample recovery |
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Logging |
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Sub-sampling techniques and sample preparation |
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Quality of assay data and laboratory tests |
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Verification of sampling and assaying |
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Location of data points |
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Data spacing and distribution |
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Orientation of data in relation to geological structure |
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Sample security |
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Audits or reviews |
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1.2 JORC TABLE 1 - SECTION 2 - REPORTING OF EXPLORATION RESULTS
(Criteria in this section apply to all succeeding sections).
Criteria | JORC Code (Section 2) Explanation | Commentary |
Mineral tenement and land tenure status |
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Exploration done by other parties |
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Geology |
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Drill hole Information |
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Data Aggregation methods |
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Relationship between mineralisation on widths and intercept lengths |
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Diagrams |
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Balanced Reporting |
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Other substantive exploration data |
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Further Work |
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1.3 JORC TABLE 1 - SECTION 3 ESTIMATION AND REPORTING OF MINERAL RESOURCES
Mineral Resources are not reported so this is not applicable to this report.
1.4 JORC TABLE 1 - SECTION 4 ESTIMATION AND REPORTING OF ORE RESERVES
Ore Reserves are not reported so this is not applicable to this report.