Eagle Mountain Mining Commences Underground Drilling at Oracle Ridge
THE DRILL SERGEANT: Eagle Mountain Mining has commenced underground drilling at the company’s 100 per cent-owned Oracle Ridge copper mine project in Arizona, USA.
Eagle Mountain Mining kicked off the drilling at Oracle Ridge following completion of initial refurbishment of the underground mine.
The program is serious with thirteen drill stations established to allow Resource upgrade and metallurgical drilling to occur from within the mine.
From the first drill station alone, the company plans to have 17 holes drilled.
Eagle Mountain expects drilling from underground to be far more efficient than drilling from surface due to shorter hole lengths and less impact from weather events.
Underground drilling will prioritise the upgrading of existing Indicated and Inferred Resources into Measured and Indicated Resources respectively, with a focus on those areas of the deposit expected to be mined in the first five years of potential production.
The additional confidence achieved will assist in technical and economic studies.
An underground wall sampling program was also commenced targeting the large exposure of copper mineralisation in the underground workings to generate high-quality underground geological maps and semi-continuous samples across the exposed mineralisation.
From this, Eagle Mountain hopes to better understand small scale grade variability, assess the representativity of the existing Mineral Resource Estimate and identify suitable areas for additional metallurgical work such as bulk sampling.
“With the completion of the initial underground refurbishment at Oracle Ridge, we are now ramping up the underground activities,” Eagle Mountain Mining CEO Tim Mason said.
“It is unique to access in-situ mineralisation compared to drill core and we are committed to make the most of this significant advantage.
“We recently kicked-off a drilling program to upgrade our existing resource to higher confidence categories.
“Drilling from underground is a game changer for the project due to improved efficiencies with shorter hole lengths and less impact due to inclement weather.
“The program is focused on those mine areas where production is expected to occur in the first five years of the potential mine life.
“We have also recently commenced an extensive wall mapping program targeting approximately four kilometres of mineralisation exposed underground.”