24 Drill season was always always always focussed around increasing the STORM MRE. Increased MRE vital to healthy near term DSO operation and vital to getting part 2 of Taurus funding in.
So it comes as no surprise that for a majority of the season to date the RCs have been focussed on infill and expansion of Cyclone and Chinook. The announcements have all the drill locations that verify this
Is infill and expansion drilling likely to have any bonanza grades....no...and not expected. I want to see assays that are more of what we have at both and expect there will be dusters in there too as expansion drilling is all about finding the edges of reserve. Dusters in expansion are expected...dusters in exploration drilling is another thing. One is finding the edge of the known resource, the other is not finding anything.
Now I should mention they are not doing RC visuals. So 120 odd (maybe more ) rc assays still to come ...a majority of them pure MRE fodder and the company has already said they envisage significantly increasing the existing MRE from the drilling they have already done. Great
A few weeks back they were confident enough of the increased MRE that they sent the heli rig to Tempest and then on to Tornado and Blizzard and I believe more recently further on over Storm toward the bay. Are these exploration RC holes being drilled to add to the MRE?...No Absolutely not. It has been sent to locations where EM has identified anomalies....and if those assays come back and confirm further the relationship between EM anomalies and copper then that does nothing for the MRE but better still it verifies that we are sitting on a copper district with potential "storm" discoveries right along 100km of copper horizon. That's a BIGGY ...that indicates it's a district...and those assays we still await.
Speaking of assays...AW1 doesn't do them, they are 100% reliant on 3rd party to get them done so delays in those are not on AW1.... And lets face it we have sent the lab well over 20,000m of drill core to assay...and I doubt we are their only clients
So they hit 20,000m several weeks ago and have been drilling 2 x rc rigs (one heli, one mobile) and 1 x DD, 24 hours a day 7 days a week since then and likely several ongoing weeks, weather gods being kind.
In amongst all this we have had a recent shift change on site.....so fresh staff ...clearly on expectation that drilling will continue for a while and to unload the ship with next years supplies that's due.
I know Dave only arrived back yesterday from his recent trip...a mining/investor conference amongst other things...so when I see yesterday on the ass end of a trip like that ...lets say it wouldn't surprise me at all to see new player in the T20 ...Indeed the T20 in a few days when yesterday's mayhem is included, will help establish what happened. I will try and get one
As for DD....2 holes done and assays awaited....not overdue....DD3 was in progress I believe they had some interruption to it ...possibly the shift change but that it got back on track. At 30m/day it would barely be to depth now even without interruptions so again....nothing to see here.
In any case the 24 season has never been about exploration to find the source. If we have time sure ...we have the rig ...but they are slow and expensive and we have 100km of copper horizon to explore to find. We have what ???? 6 or 7 deep holes so far....and I stand to be corrected but Escondida had over 100 DD holes in the area by several companies before the actual discovery. So finding the source is nice and awesome if we can do in a handful of DD holes but far more likely if we get DSO up and running and can self fund Swiss cheesing until we nail it and add its bulk to our reserve .
So in summary:
NFI what yesterday was about but best guess is tree was shaken as a result of Daves US Investor trip and they found a nervous market waiting for assays to frighten. And frighten they done did.
Also worth noting we are playing with 2 perhaps more traditional Lassonde models here. The Storm DSO is the core one driving us...we are post discovery low awaiting the pre DSO operation upswing. Tempest and Typhoon being 50 and 10km away would both be new discoveries....so will have their own. (Yeah the new shallow discoveries at Storm itself don't add as are being considered part of Storm itself. Then there is the Deep....that too will have its own Lassonde Curve...and SP impact....and all of them will overlap. We are not a one trick copper pony here but are from the markets perspective until district or deep are proven. .... hopefully this season still
Patience required.
GLTAH
Gottinhimmel
AW1 Price at posting:
10.0¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held
(20min delay)