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LAtIn AMeRIcA

Centaurus gets the

jump on Jaguar

here is a strong sense of vindication the company is then expected
Tamong the team at Centaurus Metals to launch into a PFS while con-
Ltd after the maiden resource estimate for tinuing to test a series of deeper
its Jaguar nickel sulphide project in north- underground targets and strike
ern Brazil exceeded expectations of both extensions of known deposits.
company and the market. Gordon said the company
Centaurus reported a maiden resource was not prepared to put a limit
of 48mt @ 1.08% nickel for 517,500t at on how big the mineralised sys-
Jaguar in late June, less than a year after tem in Brazil’s prolific Carajas
making a move on the project and within mineral province could be.
three months of completing formal hando- “When you look at the global
ver from Vale SA. resource, there’s 80% of that in
More than 80% of the resource – also the top 200m, so really from a
host to a higher-grade portion of 20.6mt @ nickel exploration perspective,
1.56% nickel for 321,400t – is within 200m we’ve probably only scratched
of surface, while 29% was classed in the the surface because most nick-
indicated category. el deposits are much deeper,”
Centaurus shares climbed from as low he said.
as 7.5% in March to a five-year high of 54c “We know from the drilling
in early July, including a 64% jump during we’ve done we’ve got vertical
the week the maiden resource was an- orebodies, we’ve got a lot of
nounced. downhole conductor plates that run well Centaurus has unveiled a sizeable maiden
Speaking to Paydirt at the end of that below the depth of current drilling, so resource for Jaguar, less than a year after
week, Centaurus managing director Dar- there’s a really strong expectation that as pouncing on the nickel sulphide project
ren Gordon said the maiden resource we drill deeper we will find more.
numbers for Jaguar had exceeded his own “I think the fact we’ve tightened up the those and had a smaller team and two rigs
expectations. drilling from the Vale drilling down to 50m running on day shift. We were fortunate
“We started drilling in November, so ba- line spacing has given us a much better that we didn’t need to be aggressively drill-
sically within six months we’ve actually tak- picture around these higher grade zones… ing at the time, but now we’re looking to
en this thing, put a JORC resource around so there’s plenty of places where this thing ramp up the drilling activity again and we
it, lifted the scale of it and really shown the can grow, but I guess it’s always important feel now that our protocols are sufficiently
high potential of it, [all] in relatively short to remember that it’s already bloody big. robust that we can actually ramp up.
order,” Gordon said. It doesn’t need to grow, but it’s still got so “All of that comes with testing. We’ve
“Anyone sitting back has gone ‘wow, much more to give.” been testing all our people and we’ll con-
there’s actually been a lot of work done Centaurus has also received wide- tinue to do that on a regular basis. Vale
here in a relatively short period of time’, but spread plaudits for being able to continue were originally given a lot of grief in Bra-
that only comes through time in country, exploring in Brazil during the global COV- zil for all their operations having so many
knowing what we’re doing, having a good ID-19 pandemic, particularly with the num- cases, but it’s not that their operations had
team of people, good communication and ber of positive cases in the South Ameri- all these cases, it was just that the com-
the drillers who really just do an outstand- can country recently surpassing 1 million. munity had so many cases. And the only
ing job. Gordon said a number of communities reason it was being identified is because
“It’s full credit to our whole team collec- and municipalities were turning to mining Vale was testing.
tively, but certainly in Brazil. We’ve always companies for leadership in COVID-19 “Now I think it’s gone full circle and all
said you can’t operate in Brazil without a testing and social distancing protocols of the municipalities and all of the regula-
good team in Brazil, and we’ve definitely to help contain the spread of a disease tors and health authorities understand that
got that. All our geological team is based in which has been claiming on average 1,000 testing is the way to go so you can identify
Tucuma and we’ve got a really good coun- deaths a day in Brazil. and isolate people.
try manager in Bruno Scarpelli heading up “As the mainstream media is reporting, “You could say that any person in Bra-
the team there. the COVID situation is not great in Brazil, zil who is working for a mining company is
“We now feel like we’ve got a really ro- but I think what you find with mining com- probably safer at work under the protocols
bust project and obviously we’ve still got to panies generally is they were very quick of the various mining companies than they
go through and do all the other work, but to react and very quick to put a number of are potentially at home. It’s a bit of a cul-
it’s a really good starting point.” procedures in place,” he said. tural thing in Brazil in that they are a really
Centaurus has already begun work on “When COVID first hit there, we scaled close-knit community generally and that’s
a scoping study to be delivered early in down the drilling. We had three rigs on where the risk comes from.”
Q4 2020. Assuming a positive outcome, double shift, so we stood down one of
– Michael Washbourne

aUSTRaLIa’S PaYDIRT aUgUST 2020 Page 49