News: AZY Rio Tinto leads copper charge into Western Australia's Paterson region, page-126

Thanks Onceover,

The amount of info out there for the broader Paterson Province is difficult for any individual to digest and not many would want to even try I suspect.  For you and me definitely fascinating.

I registered aspects of the first two points at the AGM though didn't follow up the implications.

Your comment about AEM may indicate something about Rio's long term approach to exploration if they were involved when that survey was flown in 2010. 

• Sit back for 5 years and
• then Rio JV'd in 2015,
• were applying for the ground that became Winu (Weenoo) in early 2016,
• and drilling 3 holes by the end of 2017 in addition to Citadel commitments.  

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A surprise, to me, was the chance reading of the discovery of Ridgeway by Newcrest in the 1990s.

Earlier today I commented how similar the depth and geophysical signature were between the Havieron and Carrapateena discoveries.  Add Ridgeway to the list.

HAVIERON COMPARISONS.pdf  Hopefully the links work in this PDF.

Three deposits, three very different geological environments but sharing some similarities.

The initial mine at Ridgeway had around 50Mt of 2+g/t Au and 1+% Cu which was ?block caved with the Cu paying tor the Au or vice versa such that it made a lot of money in its good years.  Looking at the 2017 resource figures shows what low grades can be mined in a "mature" mining district.  Perhaps not the Patterson though the high grade is still being found by Greatlands and ?Rio.

Once the resource geos get hold of the high grade intersections they are forced by conservative/realistic rules to apply cut off grades as well as include lower grade material that falls within mining parameters.  The result is what look like spectacular grades in intersections are merged into a lower common denominator which hopefully can be mined.

Ridgeway was and is a mine.

Carrapateena will become a mine in the near future if plans come to fruition.Carra has taken 13 YEARS to reach the current development stage.

Too early to say whether Havieron will become a mine.  The table above may give a hint of the order of magnitude for the deposit there.  For a stand alone mine in such a remote location the hurdles are huge.  The presence of the Telfer Mine and its infrastructure could help.