Response to Blythefan

I intend this to be my first and last foray onto HC. I prefer to leave the discussions to those of you with varying levels of geological knowledge, differing degrees of vested interests, and a plethora of agendas (more often than not, seemingly hidden).

Over time I have developed a respect for Blythefan’s input on a number of company threads. His/her posts are generally balanced, professional, technically informative and mostly objective. However, and primarily BECAUSE most other posters hold his input in such high regard, his most recent contribution to the THX and Red Bore discussion (http://hotcopper.com.au/posts/19128995/single) necessitates a more formal and considered response, which is contained in the pdf attached to this post.

Let me say first that if in any way he/she deems any of my response contentious, then I am very happy for him to call me or email me at [email protected] and discuss the matters in person. Which is the same offer that has been put to a number of other contributors whose posts sometimes suggest that they don’t fully appreciate the underlying reasons for THX’s approach to particular exploration programmes.

I’ll also take this opportunity to record some facts that have been misrepresented in numerous posts.
April 2010: THX involvement in Red Bore starts.
4/10 – 5/12 $2.6M total spent on exploration to deliver a 48kt indicated and inferred resource at 3.4% Cu
5/12 – 3/14 $0.2M spent on exploration. Legal dispute over earn-in.
3/14 – 5/16 $2.7M spent on exploration.
Four years from 4/10 to 3/14 were spent mainly on intense exploration of Gossan, on the incorrect preconception that it was the surface expression of a new DeGrussa orebody, and then on the legal case that resulted in THX reaching 90% equity. Exploration under a new, flexible and open-minded geological model, began in earnest in April 2014 and since then about $3M has been spent in 2.5 years. Total spend on Bryah Basin by SFR, TLM, HOR, RNI, ALY/IGO, ENT, etc etc since DeGrussa discovery in 2009? Estimates suggest well in excess of $200M in aggregate. Only discovery? Monty at 400m depth for a resource containing 99,000t copper and 55,000oz gold. Only other indications of potentially significant mineralisation of commercial grade discovered in the Bryah Basin in those 7 years? 7.05m at 28.4% Cu, 1.3 gpt Au; 32.3 gpt Ag at Red Bore.

Such results NEEDED to be pursued. And no, at the moment we STILL don’t understand where the high grade mineralisation has come from. And no, we will not spend money indiscriminately chasing at shadows. But we WILL compile, collate and interpret all the new data gained from the recent drilling programmes. And when that is done we will assess what we believe to be the most appropriate next steps. In the meantime we will continue to pursue our strategy which at present is clearly to explore our Red Dragon gold assets that have already delivered 7m at 24.5 gpt Au at Lydia. Ironic that so many posters were deriding THX nine months ago for taking on these assets.

I hope that you find the attached pdf response to Blythefan informative and instructive. And as a parting comment, I’ll share with you Phil Crabb’s comment to me yesterday: “Everybody’s an expert in hindsight – particularly when it comes to geology”. Never was a truer word spoken.

Tony Lofthouse
CEO
Thundelarra Ltd