Minotaur cuts high grades

Vancouver — Junior Minotaur Resources has tabled impressive results from the Prominent Hill prospect at the Mt. Woods joint venture in southern Australia.

Hole 5 was drilled 200 metres east of hole 3 (235 metres grading 1.05% copper, 0.57 gram gold and 0.29 gram silver per tonne, plus 130 parts per million uranium) and angled at 60 to the north. This hole returned an encouraging 1.31% copper, 0.78 gram gold, 2.4 gram silver, 143 ppm uranium and 0.53% rare earth metals. Included in the interval was a higher-grade section running 2% copper, 0.63 gram gold, 2.4 grams silver, 143 ppm uranium and 0.53% rare earth metals.

The hole cut 136 metres of sedimentary cover before hitting the mixture of hematite breccia, andesitic volcanics and metasediment. At 197 metres, the hole encountered the mineralized chalcocite-bearing hematitic breccias and bottomed in promising grades.

The latest results suggest a west-northwest strike to the mineralized breccia. Additional drilling is under way to outline the dimensions of the breccias.

In November 2001, the Australian-listed junior, together with partner BHP Billiton (BHP-N), intercepted significant copper-gold mineralization in hematite breccias while drill-testing a large discrete gravity anomaly that was slightly offset from a similar-size magnetic feature. The discovery hole was positioned on the northeastern edge of the gravity anomaly in a relatively weak portion of the feature where it narrows to about 150 metres. The lens-shaped gravity feature is just over 2 km long and ranges from 150 to 400 metres wide.

Drilled vertically to a depth of 708 metres, the discovery hole passed through 108 metres of younger barren sediments before intersecting a basement sequence of massive hematite-supported brecciated metasediments and volcanics.

The top 20 metres of the basement sequence ran 3.03 grams gold per tonne from 108 to 128 metres, followed farther down-hole by 107 metres of 1.94% copper plus 0.65 gram gold and 1.6 grams silver (including 35 metres at the base of the intercept grading 3.86% copper, 0.82 gram gold and 4.5 grams silver) at a depth of 200-307 metres.

As operator, Minotaur is carried with a 19% interest through to the first A$4 million in expenditures. Joint-venture partner BHP is earning 51%. The current tenement-holders, Newmont Mining (NEM-N), Sons of Gwalia and Sabatica, will dilute down to 23.9%, 3.8% and 2.3%, respectively.

The Mt. Woods joint venture covers 3,800 sq. km of exploration licences southeast of Coober Pedy. The Prominent Hill discovery is 125 km northwest of WMC‘s (WMC-N) Olympic Dam underground operations.