New Ballarat Gold Corporation plc (NBGC) joint venture (JV) has received positive rock sampling results of gold mineralisation surrounding Ballarat mine in the Victoria gold fields, Australia.
ROCK SAMPLING
The JV, planned for listing, is between Red Rock Resources plc (50.1%) and Power Metal (49.9%).
The results were published as NBGC announced it was granted three further licences and has restarted its drilling programme following the holidays.
The JV last year collected 24 rock samples within the Dereel project (EL 7799 and EL7327).
Gold mineralisation was successfully identified in 16 of the 24 samples and the “presence of extensive and sometimes high grade, gold mineralisation” including >0.1g/t and a highlight result of 229g/t Au.
DRILLING
On 3 January the JV restarted its five-hole diamond drill campaign for 1,000 metres which it began during December 2022 at the Berringa gold mine.
The partners are continuing to drill the first hole, BE23D001, into the Birthday South target which paused at a downhole depth of 125.7m
After two days drilling had reached 167m at which point the HQ (96mm) drill bit was replaced by an NQ (75.7mm) bit.
The final expected is approximately 420m.
EXPLORATION LICENCES
NBGC’s three further exploration licences (EL) of 7756, 7799 and 7826, take the JV’s total to 17 grants from 19 original applications, along with one purchased licence for a total 1,867km2 to date.
EL7756 is a 22km2 inlier of Crown land within EL7271, the prominent EL south of Ballarat gold mine within the Ajax project containing the old Monmouth and Happy Thought mines. Forest cover has had limited modern exploration.
EL7799 is a 3km2 inlier of Crown land originally excluded from licence EL7327 within the Dereel project.
NBGC has identified the Golden Reef (Dereel) mine as an “active high grade mine” at the turn of the last century.
The JV said that acquisition of Crown land would improve access for any future drill programme, and has gathered a number of rock chip samples in the area.
EL7826 is a 4km2 tenement enhancing the land position surrounding Ballarat mine itself and covering potential for southern extension of the main Ballarat lode system known as Ballarat south within the Ajax project.