[ferro-alloys.com]Karora Resources (TSX: KRR) — previously known as RNC Minerals — announced on Tuesday that underground drilling has returned high-grade gold and nickel intercepts at its Beta Hunt mine in Western Australia.

The mine, located 600 km from Perth in the mining town of Kambalda, is a deposit with the very rare feature of hosting both gold and nickel resources in adjacent discrete mineralized zones.

It contains an estimated 10.1Mt gold resources at 2.9 g/t for 944,000 contained ounces of gold, as well as 379Kt nickel resources at 4.42% for 15,840 contained tonnes of nickel, both in the measured and indicated category.

Drilling on the northern margin of the Western Flanks resource has discovered new gold mineralization in the footwall striking parallel to and at the top of the existing resource.

The new mineralized zone, which has a strike length of over 160 metres, remains open to the north and up-dip, and occurs beneath the basalt/ultramafic contact where new high-grade nickel mineralization has also been discovered.

Following a short pause in drilling at Beta Hunt due to covid-19 precautions, the company now has two drills operating full time on both gold and nickel targets.

“Our drilling in the Western Flanks shear zone, which is one of two gold production zones at Beta Hunt, has returned very strong results to the north, upgrading the existing resource and expanding the known mineralization with the discovery of a new footwall zone,” chairman and CEO Paul Andre Huet stated.

“Encouragingly, both of our production zones, Western Flanks and A Zone, remain open to the north and at depth,” he added.

Given these drill results, the company has increased its underground drilling budget by 4,100 metres, and will continue to test the Western Flanks zone to the north, with the aim of adding up to another 280 metres of strike and 80 metres of depth to the zone.

Meanwhile, Karora is also working to advance its Higginsville gold operations, located approximately 75 km south of Beta Hunt. It recently received results of a regional gravity survey over a large area that has had very little historical exploration.

Preliminary review of the data has identified multiple gold targets including typical Higginsville-style primary deposits and potentially large scale paleochannel deposits. A detailed desktop study is underway to rank these target areas to allow for systematic, priority-based drill testing later this year.

“It is evident from the gravity survey and ongoing exploration target definition that the Higginsville area has one of the most exciting unexplored land packages within the region,” Huet said.

The company is continuing its drill program at Higginsville, with two drills currently turning and plans to add additional drilling capacity in the future.

Shares of Karora Resources jumped 6.1% by midday Tuesday on the latest drill results. The Toronto-based miner has a market capitalization of approximately C$527.61 million.

(Mining.com)

• [Editor:王可]