Azure Minerals achieves high gold recoveries from Loma Bonita testwork

THE DRILL SERGEANT: Azure Minerals (ASX: AZS) has received results of preliminary metallurgical testwork for the company’s Loma Bonita gold prospect in Mexico.

The work involved industry standard bottle roll tests, undertaken at the laboratories of Kappes, Cassiday and Associates in Reno, Nevada, USA.

The testwork focused on two different size fractions, comprising ground and particle sizes, which Azure explained, are being tested to simulate gold recoveries that might be expected to be achieved from conventional milling (eg carbon-in-pulp or carbon-in-leach processing) and heap leach gold processing, respectively.

Tests were conducted on 20 core samples (10 fine ground and 10 coarse crushed), collected and composited from diamond drill holes MDPD-007, MDPD-011, MDPD-012 and MDPD-016.

Gold recoveries of between 88 per cent and 97 per cent were achieved on the ground material, with an overall average recovery of greater than 93 per cent.

Tests on the crushed material achieved gold recoveries of between 42 per cent and 89 per cent, with an overall average recovery of more than 73 per cent.

“The discovery of gold at Loma Bonita in such close proximity to the company’s Mesa de Plata silver deposit was very exciting,” Azure Minerals managing director Tony Rovira said in the company’s announcement to the Australian Securities Exchange.

“These positive metallurgical test results are highly encouraging and indicate that Loma Bonita has the potential to add significant value to any future combined production with Mesa de Plata.

“We’re progressing this prospect as fast as we can with additional drilling underway to expand the current footprint of the mineralised zone and to provide additional samples for optimising the mineral processing route.”

Email: admin@azureminerals.com.au

Website: www.azureminerals.com.au