Eastern Metals Ltd

Arunta

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The Arunta Project is strategically located between the Stuart Highway, the Adelaide-Darwin rail corridor, and the Amadeus gas pipeline, east of Barrow Creek in the Northern Territory (NT). The project landholding totals 593km2 and comprises two groups of tenements, Neutral Junction to the north and Adnera Hill.

Eastern Metals’ core focus within the Arunta Project is on the 

 prospects, located within the Neutral Junction group.

Home of Bullion was discovered in 1923 by William Garnett; however, active mining did not start until 1936 with a trial parcel of 110 tonnes. To 1949, the mine produced 3,185 tonnes of ore at 22.5% Cu. The main ore mined was chalcocite between the 120-180 foot levels, which was then transported to Alice Springs and onwards to Port Kembla in NSW for processing.

The deposit is a structurally controlled, siliciclastic-mafic, volcanic massive sulphide (VMS) style deposit, developed as two sheared sulphide lodes within the Mesoproterozoic Bullion Schist – Main Lode and South Lode.

The Main Lode consists of two sections separated by a 20m gap. It has a total length of 160m, a thickness of 4m, and a depth ranging from 200-500m below surface. The South Lode measures 220m in length, 3m in thickness, and extends to a depth of 500m.

Eastern Metals acquired Home of Bullion in 2021 and completed a four-hole diamond drilling program in 2022. The Company then engaged SRK to update the 2014 Mineral Resource Estimate completed by the previous owner, Kidman Resources, to incorporate the results of the 2022 drilling and changes in metals prices.

This led to the delineation of an updated Mineral Resource Estimate for the Home of Bullion deposit in March 2023 of 3.1Mt at an average grade of 1.7% copper, 2.0% zinc, 35 grams per tonne silver, 1.1% lead, 0.17 parts per million gold and 0.02% cobalt.

Expressed as a copper-equivalent (CuEq), this equates to 3.1Mt at an average grade of 2.9% CuEq for 89.9kt of contained copper-equivalent metal.

 to view the full Mineral Resource Estimate announcement.

The deposit consists of two principal lodes: the Main Lode and the South Lode, with an additional low grade footwall unit (LGFW) directly abutting the South Lode. The deposit was mined intermittently between the 1930s and 1950s, with at least three shafts sunk to a maximum depth of 90 metres. The lodes have been traced for at least 170 metres underground, with an average width of 2.4 metres and a maximum width of 6 metres.

The 2022 four-hole drilling program increased the 2014 Resource of 2.5Mt (2.8% CuEq) by 24%, with the contained copper-equivalent metal increasing from 70kt to 89.9kt – an increase of 28%. These results suggest that further drilling will increase the Resources, especially given the south and lower main lodes are open along strike and at depth.

The Bullion Schist, denoted by a magnetic-high trend, is the primary host of copper mineralisation. The trend extends between Home of Bullion and the Mulbangas copper prospect, 9km north-west along strike, which may indicate additional zones of mineralisation along strike.

Both Home of Bullion and Mulbangas sit in the Aileron Province, a similar Neoproterozoic geological setting as KGL Resources’ Jervois copper deposit, which hosts a Resource of 23.8Mt @ 2.02% Cu, 25.3 g/t Ag and 0.25 g/t Au.

Prospect D contains copper-nickel sulphide mineralisation that has been mapped over a length of 2km.

A high-grade zone has been traced for more than 250 metres and remains largely untested at depth, with the mineralisation forming a tabular body that is folded with the sedimentary rocks.

Eastern Metals considers that the Prospect D deposit may be either a replacement unit within the dolerite or a VMS deposit, with additional exploration planned to further define the nature of the orebody.

Prospect D is located 4km off the Stuart Highway, with good access to infrastructure.