Nice one boys - Asked about potential joint venture partners, Brown confirmed Inca had already been approached by several, “and we note with interest that BHP have become neighbours”.
The company, undertaking a maiden drilling campaign at its Riqueza zinc-silver-lead project in Peru, posted an impressive 438% share price gain in the 12 months to May 31.
Managing director Ross Brown told Mining Journal from site he wanted to maintain “organic, real-time” commentary on a project the US$25 million market-cap company had turned “from a small project into a large project” since securing its drilling permit and embarking on a 14,000m drilling program in April.
“To date we’ve completed 11 holes and approximately 2,000m, so the program is very much in its infancy,” he said.
“When we first walked on to the property there were eight known mineralised bodies, six east-west trending veins, a manto and a vein [or dyke]. They occurred in two prospects. Little else was known. Spring forward 18 months after completing several phases of mapping and sampling and we now count known mineralised bodies in the dozens.
“We stopped counting veins at 36. Including all veins types, east-west, north-south, irregular and tension-gash varieties, there would be over 100 individual veins of varying lengths and thicknesses. The manto is now known over a 2km-by-800m area.
“We now have three official prospects, Humaspunco, Uchpanga and the new Pinta prospect. Hitherto unknown at Riqueza, we recently discovered two large intrusive rocks. These are important as they were the missing link in our intrusive-related replacement deposit exploration model.
“Not any more.
“Riqueza becomes a look-alike to the eight intrusive-related deposits occurring within 50km of Riqueza. All of these are active mines or have been mined.
“We’ve focussed on the Humaspunco prospect simply because it hosts the majority of manto and vein targets. It’s pleasing to report that all targets to date have been hit; eleven known veins and the manto sequence, but we are also identifying new veins that have not day-lighted.
“The most pleasing result is that the majority of these veins are mineralised.
“The discoveries won’t lead to changing the program. Phase 1 has a broad-reach objective. The objectives of Phase 2 and Phase 3, loosely defined in terms of total metres, are to ‘step out’ then to ‘infill’, respectively.”
Asked about potential joint venture partners, Brown confirmed Inca had already been approached by several, “and we note with interest that BHP have become neighbours”.
If Inca’s exploration model proves valid, Riqueza might be one big deposit.
“I’m not saying all of it could be mined,” Brown said.
“I’m saying each of the prospects may be genetically and perhaps spatially linked. That grade carries between is unlikely. Now, if you add a fourth prospect to the mix, so new it doesn’t name, which is defined as a 3km-by 1.2km satellite anomaly, the Riqueza zone of interest starts to get very large indeed, extending 5km in the north-south direction and 3km in the east-west direction.”
Brown has been an exploration geologist for more than 30 years and says the emerging grade picture at Riqueza is intriguing to say the least, with about 50% of all surface samples taken averaging 13% zinc, 311g/t silver and 16% lead.
“Very few” other projects compared.
“These high grades were generated during grab sampling programs. In channel-sampling, which is a non-selective sampling method, grades were circa halved.
“I mention this, not just for transparency sake but to stress that even halved grades are high.”
ICG Price at posting:
1.4¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held
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