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QueensLAnD

Duke ready to rise

in Queensland

aising $8 million from two Zoom calls porphyry systems of North Queensland plexities.
Rand a single face-to-face meeting was and then there is a gap to the modern-day “At the moment Mt Flora could potentially
good for Duke Exploration Ltd when it listed supergene systems and nothing between, be a standalone and could be a project that
in 2020, however, the merits of pounding yet there is Bundarra. Therefore, from a ge- starts and keeps growing as we drill the
the pavement the old fashion way may be of ological perspective Bundarra is something orebody out. It will take a reasonable time
some benefit for the company now. that hasn’t been recognised or explored in to have a final resource at Mt Flora, but get-
“Having a geologically unusual project to Australia to this point.” ting a number out early will help us know
what else is out there and generally under- Apart from the historical workings picked what we are working with and we can keep
stood, some people don’t believe it is real,” up, Duke has identified 56 new targets (103 updating from there,” Partington said.
Duke operations manager Greg Partington in total) to test, with five ready for resource Highlights from first assays from re-
told Paydirt. drilling. source drilling at Mt Flora included 6m @
“With it being hard to roadshow last year, A maiden resource at the Mt Flora pros- 1.39% copper, 29.4 g/t silver and 0.03 g/t
getting in front of people to explain the story pect is being worked towards for mid-year, gold from 51m (Mt Flora underground mine
was difficult. But we have money [$6 mil- while drilling at the likes of Quarry – the new lode); 3m @ 2.71%, 11.9 g/t silver and 0.31
lion], we have a great project and people discovery 500m from Mt Flora – and Quorn g/t gold from 100m; 17m @ 1.12%, 11.4 g/t
will start to cotton onto what Bundarra is all will be helped along when the company silver and 0.13 g/t gold from 55m; 16m @
about.” adds a second rig to its programme. 1.17%, 10.5 g/t silver and 0.08 g/t gold from
Back in the 1800s, Bundarra was the Duke is discovering amid the resource 84m; 8m @ 2.99%, 69 g/t silver and 0.24
highest-grade copper project in Australia drill out that mineralisation is at surface, g/t gold from 61m and 6m @ 2.18%, 23.8 g/t
boasting production grades of 7-16% from continuing to depth, and met test work silver and 0.1 g/t gold from 20m.
underground and surface mining. completed to date hasn’t revealed any com- Partington said Bundarra was “amazing”
With 47 historic workings across the ten- from a geological perspective and Duke’s
ement, Duke has been able to advance findings may well have “serious exploration
its exploration activities and through drill- implications” in the near future.
ing and geophysics, Tier 1 scale potential Just like Julimar and Hemi, Bundarra
has been confirmed at Bundarra, Central is an unusual geological system that has
Queensland. been bypassed and Duke’s success could
All going well, Bundarra – in some sort break open a new era of exploration in
of size and shape – could be in play in two Queensland.
years’ time given its mining friendly loca- “This idea that Australia as an exploration
tion, 145km south-west of Mackay and destination is mature is wrong. You have to
85km east of Moranbah by road. think differently. It was believed that you
Bundarra is in a coal mining heartland of don’t get porphyry systems of the age we
Queensland, which means there is A-grade are seeing at Bundarra, when in actual fact
infrastructure in place and top-notch mining you do, which means there is a whole new
services outfits on the doorstep. exploration space that opens up,” Parting-
That part of the equation – a near-term ton said.
large-scale copper-silver-gold develop- “When you change your thinking, sud-
ment opportunity – is easier to understand denly you have things on the surface that
than the geological curiosity which charac- haven’t been looked at before. We have al-
terises Duke’s 100%-owned flagship asset. ready pegged a couple of tenements that
“This granite is very young, it is Creta- A hole targeting the VTEM plate anomaly look very similar. These porphyry-style
ceous. If you look at all the research that north of Mt Flora intersected visible copper systems never occur on their own, which
has been done in Australia there is not mineralisation in stacked veins from 47-225m you see at Lachlan [Fold Belt, New South
meant to be major metallic systems of that down hole. The intercept encouraged Duke as Wales] and the like.”
age here,” Partington said. it works to understand the source of regional – Mark Andrews
“I think the Permo-carboniferous systems VTEM anomalies at Bundarra and the scale of
are the youngest ones recognised, like the the copper-silver mineralisation at Mt Flora

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