Press releaseChris didn't give much economic detail. His update was mostly geology. I interpret "variable porphyry alteration and mineralization" as meaning the results are all over the map. With drilling delays in 24-01,02 and 03 I'm no longer expecting assays until July sometime. The RC drill should speed things up when it arrives.
A porphyry stock (white granite) seldom reaches the surface. It freezes part of the way up. Layers of mineralization and alteration form around it in shells. The uppermost and most distal shell is the lithiocap which is silcate rock acid attacked into aluminosilicates (pyrophyllite) and clay. There appears to be a thrust fault between the 2023 holes and 2024-02 and 03 which has upthrusted the 2023 holes and downthrusted 2024-02 and 03. The mineralization is still there in 2024-02 and 03 but it is now deeper down. Where does the hypogene Bornite layer fit into all of this? 2024-01 probably encountered it at the normal depth but I'm guessing that it has been downthrusted in 2024-02 and 03.
You can think of this part of the world as a stack of pancakes angled at a shallow angle each of which have slid against the others and then the stack was leveled. Each pancake is a block of rock and each boundary is a thrust fault. All of this post dates the porphyry and has chopped the porphyry up. We are seeing greater preservation to the NW and I'm expecting ever less preservation to the SE.
Too bad about 24-07 but when water is pushing the drill out of the hole there isn't much you can do.
The average hole depth is 450 m. That translates into a 44 hole programme.
"D" type Pyrite veins are late stage veins which cross cut all previous rock units. They are very Pyrite rich with strong alteration halos but are seldom of any economic importance.