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nIcKeL conFeRence ReVIeW

Mawson quest gathers pace

egend Mining Ltd has become a staple of from 400m to 1.4-1.6km.
Lthe Australian Nickel Conference agenda “We have also identified three new zones
but this year’s presentation had a fresh feel, of massive sulphide,” Kiddie said. “They
in more ways than one. weren’t targeted, just found via systematic
As managing director Mark Wilson was exploration. It speaks volumes about the
convalescing after recent medical treatment, size of the system driving Mawson. Wher-
the face on the stage was different with ex- ever the intrusion thins, where it focuses, it
ecutive director Oliver Kiddie taking to the drops out massive sulphide mineralisation, Oliver Kiddie
podium. And, given the progress the com- all of the step-out holes hit that intrusion.
pany has made in the last 12 months, the That is a good sign for a fertile, well-en- diamond drilling to evaluate them at depth,”
Legend story has also transformed. dowed system.” he said.
The ASX-listed explorer has carved a Such is Legend’s confidence in the poten- Aircore drilling has shown Magnus to
niche for itself among investors as the most tial for Mawson, it has already begun met- contain the same troctolite host rocks as
progressive junior explorer on the notori- allurgical work. A recent Phase 1 “sighter” Voisey’s Bay in Canada, adding to Legend’s
ously prospective, but difficult, Fraser Range programme showing separate nickel and enthusiasm for diamond drilling.
belt. While IGO Ltd’s Nova mine remains the copper concentrates could be produced to “I logged the first diamond core last month
only economic discovery in the province, high recoveries (91.7% and 93.1% respec- myself and I was really encouraged by the
Legend has consistently had the technical tively). intense nature of the changes in the rocks,”
success which suggests the next find is im- While Mawson will continue to be the main Kiddie said.
minent. focus, the company has also applied some Octagonal was originally tested by the
The company’s discovery of the Mawson of its $15 million annual exploration budget Creasy Group Pty Ltd with drilling hitting
intrusive complex on its Rockford project in to regional work. nickel-copper sulphide mineralisation across
2019 sparked plenty of interest in the stock The company has more than 30 regional 3km of strike.
and while Legend is yet to define a maiden targets with drilling already started at the four “We believe that Octagonal intrusion is up
resource, the prospect continues to expand. most advanced – Octagonal, Magnus, Hur- to 1,000m thick. All the drilling to date has re-
Legend has had two rigs on site at Maw- ley and Crean. turned mineralisation which begs the ques-
son since the start of the year, performing Kiddie said after some initial aircore suc- tion: ‘What’s at the base?’,” Kiddie said. “We
what Kiddie described as “systematic explo- cess, the company had deployed a diamond are filling this pipeline with the belief that we
ration”. rig to the Magnus and Octagonal prospects. are sitting on 3,000sq km of the largest un-
The result has been an extension to the “These are two fertile intrusions which sit derexplored nickel belt in the world.”
strike of the mineralised chonolith host rock on the same belt as Nova and we are now

Cooee, come mine with me are near that hit,” he said. “Essentially we’ve
got 700m of open trough with only two lines
of drilling from WMC days. We believe that
erhaps there was no better spokesper- Conference, the company started carving its one of those only just clipped the trough.
Pson for the essence of the nickel story own name amid the more established nickel “East Cooee is emerging as a new
than Lunnon Metals Ltd managing director players with some high-grade results over its system; it’s going to be a strong focus.
Ed Ainscough, an ex-WMC geologist who prospective Kambalda landholdings. It’s relatively shallow…we’ve got multiple
is passionate about Kambalda opportunities Drilling at the East Cooee hanging-wall sources of nickel that are able to be drilled
missed in the last boom. prospect, proximal to the historic Jan Shaft out very quickly.”
and Foster mines, achieved 9m @ 1.66% Just like Ainscough’s own experiences
nickel from 113m, including 1m @ 7.44% in Kambalda proving valuable, Lunnon
from 113m, and 8m @ 1.31% from 130m, continues to benefit from historical drilling
including 2m @ 3.46% from 136m. that guides their next steps. The company
Ainscough said that WMC’s previous drill- is now focused on completing DHTEM
ing came within a hair’s length of the nickel surveys from Foster drill intersections.
sulphides and he hopes to further prove that “All of the work we do is fundamentally
prospectivity under the Lunnon banner. based, in some cases, on 20-30 years
“We started drilling at the end of July with of geological records,” Ainscough said.
RC and added a diamond rig in August “There’s 350km of diamond core from
focused on East Cooee,” he said. “We al- WMC days that sits in the Kambalda court-
ways knew it was prospective, WMC did a yard.
ed Ainscough fair amount of drilling there, but really only “There’s three pathways to success
clipped the edges of what we think are multi- at Foster. There’s the drilling, the historic
Lunnon is looking to follow in the footsteps ple sources of nickel.” drill core programme, and then all of that
of Mincor Resources NL, IGO Ltd, and Pan- Drilling at the East Trough target, just be- generates targets for when we eventually
oramic Resources Ltd – those which Ains- low East Cooee, turned up results of 2m @ dewater the mine and move underground.”
cough names as influences on the ambitions 5.07% nickel.
of the new company which listed in June. “We need to do downhole EM to assess – Fraser Palamara
Ahead of its debut at the Australian Nickel approximate sources of nickel sulphides that

Page 46 NOVeMBeR 2021 aUSTRaLIa’S PaYDIRT