re: new discovery Australian Mines Hits Nickel AgainBlair Nickel...

re: new discovery Australian Mines Hits Nickel Again

Blair Nickel Mine Boxcut Decline


In only the second round of RC drilling at the Anomaly 11 nickel prospect, junior nickel miner, Australian Mines, has continued to intersect disseminated/matrix nickel sulphide mineralisation, including 2m at 2.25% nickel within 10m at 1.25% nickel.

Anomaly 11, 6km south of the Blair nickel mine and 20km southeast of Kalgoorlie, is the first of 10 core targets that were generated from a low level aeromagnetic survey completed in mid 2004 over the Blair project tenements.

An 18 hole RC drill program was undertaken to define the strike extent and plunge potential of the nickel sulphide mineralisation at Anomaly 11. The drilling replicated the thickness and grade of previous nickel intersections but also highlighted the potential for a higher grade core of mineralisation in a steep north plunging shoot

Australian Mines MD, Barry Cahill, said given the company had only drilled a small number of holes the results to date provided a great deal of encouragement that Australian Mines had found a prospective new nickel deposit.

"Who wouldn't be excited about the chances of discovering a new nickel deposit, especially when, in our very first drill program at Anomaly 11, one hole intersected 3m at 2.33 % nickel," he said.

"What makes it more pleasing is that Anomaly 11 sits within an area that has been explored in the past, yet we have still managed to find nickel mineralisation only 40m below the surface.

"The prospect has a fertile basal ultramafic contact, in a similar geological setting to that from which nickel is mined within the Blair mine, which bodes well for the other core nickel targets identified over the Blair lease holding," he said.

An electromagnetic (EM) geophysical survey has commenced over the prospect utilising the latest in EM technology that is highly sensitive to extremely conductive massive sulphide mineralisation. Such mineralisation previously has been difficult to detect using the conventional coil EM equipment.

Mr Cahill said the EM would be used to define new conductive targets to be drill tested in the next program, along with the potential for higher grades possibly associated with massive sulphides within the interpreted north plunging shoot.

- 21 Jan 2005