Indiana starts deep drilling at Gawler gold discovery

Indiana Resources is set to begin probing the depths of its Minos gold discovery in South Australia, with diamond drilling scheduled to kick off later this week. The company says earlier rounds of shallow reverse circulation drilling have now set the stage for the upcoming diamond program, which will delve into the roots of the gold-rich system that has already returned assays of over half an ounce per tonne.

Previous drilling at Minos returned a number of intercepts that hint at a high-grade source core to the system at depth. Deeper intervals include 12 metres at 10.36 grams per tonne gold from 120m and 5m grading a stunning 24.35 g/t from 106m down-hole.

The company says that as part of the previous drilling campaign three pre-collars were emplaced along the strike length of Minos, allowing diamond drilling to test below several thick intercepts of shallow, high-grade mineralisation, including 38m at 6.54 g/t gold from only 28m down-hole.

Indiana has said the diamond drilling would provide key geological data for the discovery and allow the company to begin unravelling both the geochemical and structure controls on the mineralisation.

Indiana’s Minos discovery sits on a regional structure known as the Lady Labyrinth Shear zone that is a north-west trending and stretches across more than 30km of strike in the east of the company’s tenure.

The company’s 5,000 sq.km ground holding sits about 620km north of Adelaide in SA’s mineral-rich Gawler Craton. This re-emerging province is rapidly becoming a mecca for copper and gold explorers in the wake of a rash of discoveries in the region, including ASX-listed Coda Minerals’ recent Emmie Bluff iron oxide, copper-gold find that recently resulted in a tripling of the company’s share price.

Other players in the region include ASX-aspirant Barton Gold, which holds the Tunkillia, Challenger and Tarcoola mining centres west of Indiana’s ground and copper explorer Taruga Minerals, whose Mt Craig project lies to the east.

Whilst Indiana remains firmly focused on the Minos discovery, the company is already broadening its horizons and is nearing completion of reconnaissance aircore drilling along more than 6km of strike of the Lady Labyrinth shear. The original 60-hole aircore program was designed to test extensions of the shear to both the north-west and south-east of Minos, however that program has been extended to include additional drilling between the Minos and Ariadne prospects.

The work between Minos and Ariadne covers about 1,000m of strike and is designed to test a theory that the two prospects are part of a larger auriferous system. Early-stage shallow drilling at Ariadne has already returned encouraging results including 11m grading 2.44 g/t gold from only 40m depth.

With Indiana’s regional aircore drilling nearing completion and diamond drilling set to investigate the bowels of the Lady Labyrinth shear, punters won’t have long to wait to see if the company has a tiger by the tail in this resurgent terrane.

Is your ASX-listed company doing something interesting? Contact: matt.birney@wanews.com.au