Laconia picks-up Peruvian project
Gold and base metals explorer Laconia Resources (ASX:LCR) has added some Latin-American rhythm to its portfolio of advanced domestic projects.
Laconia recently reached an agreement to acquire the Rasuhuilca gold-silver development project in the South American country of Peru.
The project, located 500 kilometres south east of the capital Lima, in the Andean volcanic arc, is an advanced high-grade development, which Laconia considers to hold significant near-term development potential and major exploration upside.
“We are very excited about getting a foothold within Peru but we are also determined to maintain a tight focus on our projects here in Western Australia,” Laconia Resources managing director Ian Stuart told The Inside Story.
“Exploration work at both Lennons Find and at 701 Mile has achieved some extremely encouraging results.
“The drilling program we completed at Lennons Find last year achieved a number of high-grade hits in holes outside the previous Hammerhead Resource and on two other prospects, Bronze Whaler and Tiger.”
Laconia completed a 42-hole, 1,939 metre RC drill program at Lennons Find project that consistently intersected high-grade silver and zinc mineralisation.
Results from Hammerhead included: 4 metres at 174 grams per tonne silver, 0.23 grams per tonne gold, 2.35 per cent zinc, 0.08 per cent copper, 1.04 per cent lead from 150 metres.
At the Bronze Whaler prospect, high grade silver mineralisation was intersected near surface and along strike, including: 5m at 117g/t silver, 0.66g/t gold, 0.67 per cent zinc, 0.23 per cent copper, 1.52 per cent lead from 10m.
Results achieved at the Tiger prospect, included: 2m at 232g/t silver, 0.56g/t gold, 0.07 per cent zinc, 0.08 per cent copper from 15m.
Lennons Find Resource location plan. Source: Company announcement
The success of the drilling enabled Laconia to release an updated Mineral Resource for Lennons Find, which now stands at 1.85 million tonnes at 11.4 per cent zinc equivalent .
The upgrade represents a 37 per cent increase in contained zinc metal equivalent from the previous Resource estimate.
It also represents a 117 per cent increase in total tonnes from the company’s previous Resource released to the Australian Securities Exchange in March 2011.
Laconia also announced a new oxide Resource at Lennons Find of 197,000 tonnes at 89 grams per tonne silver, 0.37 grams per tonne gold, 0.2 per cent copper, 1.2 per cent lead and 1.4 per cent zinc.
The company now has further drilling planned for Lennons Find that will test for additional resources at depth at the Hammerhead deposit and to target further oxide resources within the project area.
In addition a program of RC drilling will target a potential shallow supergene enrichment zone below the current drilling being undertaken at the Tiger and Bronze Whaler prospects and other mineralised prospects – Mako and Grey Nurse.
Auger drilling and soil sampling at the 701 Mile project also returned encouraging results.
The 701 Mile project lies approximately 80 kilometres southeast of Newman, within the north eastern portion of the Collier Basin, formally known as the Bangermall Basin, and is transected by a regionally significant structure called the Tangadee Lineament.
The area has been subjected to little previous exploration, although project scale aeromagnetics has indicated a north easterly trending structural grain, which has been interpreted to be a continuation of the Tangadee Lineament.
One inconvenience Laconia has encountered at 701 Mile is a lot of superficial ground cover, which has made soil sampling difficult.
“701 Mile remains to be something of an enigma at this stage,” Stuart said.
“We conducted an Auger drilling program over the entire tenement just to get through that cover to obtain some solid geochemical samples.
“What resulted from that was a 15 kilometre long anomaly that is high in silver that is telling us that 701 Mile is potentially prospective to be a precious/base metal deposit.”
Laconia has been fortified by the early results from 701 Mile and intends flying a further aeromagnetic survey over the prospect in order to ascertain the make-up of its structures.
“We always considered it to be exceptionally prospective and now we are thinking it is really, really prospective to be something large, Stuart said.
“It is still an exploration play, but, it is a bloody good one.”
With much promise on offer domestically Laconia considers the Rasuhuilca project to be a bolt-on endeavour to complement its existing portfolio rather than a new key focus for the company.
Laconia reached an agreement to acquire the Rasuhuilca project from Perth-based exploration company Gold Mines of Peru.
The company will pay a consideration of 42 million Laconia shares, 14.5 million performance shares and a cash payment of $120,000 paid over six months to a third party.
As part of the deal Laconia will also acquire Gold Mines of Peru’s other Peruvian projects, the Motil and Porcuchia gold-silver tailings projects.
Laconia has recently raised $1.34 million through the issue of 33.6 million shares at $0.04 per share to advance work across its new Peruvian purchases.
The Rasuhuilca project comprises four concessions, labelled Patacancha No. 1 to 4, covering an area of 2,765 hectares.
The concessions partly cover an extensive high-sulphidation alteration system, which in turn, contains a number of gold-silver mineralisation zones.
Gold-silver mineralisation appears at the project as a high-sulphidation epithermal style mineralisation.
The most advanced mineralised body in the project is the Rasuhuilca zone, which has been subjected to underground development over its central 250m long portion.
Within this section a vertical extent of some 180m and reaches a thickness from 17m to 40m in a steeply south-plunging shoot.
Average grades from underground channel sampling have returned around two grams per tonne gold and 185 g/t silver.
“It is an acquisition that makes extremely good sense for a company of our size,” Stuart said.
“It is an advanced project with a modest resource in place at present of 350,000 tonnes at five grams per tonne of gold with enormous exploration potential.
“We are confident that with a bit of practical exploration work we can develop some upside at Rasuhuilca very quickly.”
The Resource, although modest, was the initial aspect of Rasuhuilca that captured Laconia’s attraction.
The project had also undergone some development work carried out, including a Feasibility Study that was completed in 2008.
Having compiled all the available data it has from the historical work Laconia considers it may be able to bring the Rasuhuilca project into production within the next 12 to 18 months.
If this can be achieved Rasuhuilca has potential to establish early cashflow for the company, which could then be used to explore the many potential targets scattered across the tenement.
“We’re approaching things with fresh eyes as far as exploration goes,” Stuart said.
“The mindset of the previous owners’ appears to have been to recognise the existence of high grade gold and silver veining so understandably that was where they put their efforts.
“We will explore for more high grade vein systems but we are also stepping back and saying you don’t get such tell-tale signs such as an alteration halo like the one we have without having a porphyry system sitting in the middle of it, so let’s go and find it.”
Laconia Resources Limited (ASX:LCR)
…The Short Story
HEAD OFFICE
Level 1, 41 – 43 Ord Street
West Perth WA 6005
Ph: +61 8 9486 1599
Fax: +61 8 9486 7899
Email: info@laconia.com.au
Web: www.laconia.com.au
DIRECTORS
Michael Sharwood
Ian Stuart
Matthew Howison
MAJOR SHAREHOLDERS
Independence Group NL 8.65%
Pandell Pty Ltd 8.32%
Ian Stuart 5.79%
SHARES ON ISSUE
81.9 million
MARKET CAPITALISATION
3.8 million (at 1 Feb 2012)