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Pathfinder joins party in Argentina Challenger on

the rise

in Argentina

by Mark Andrews
Half of the historic Hualilan resource was based on
underground sampling and mapping
he GMJ Explorer of the Year honours list has always been
Theavily populated by companies focused on elephant country
in Western Australia and West Africa. Hualilan is a high-grade gold project, with a historic skarn resource
of 627,000oz gold @ 13.7 g/t (assuming 10 g/t gold equivalent),
The applecart was not toppled in 2020, with De Grey Mining Ltd
associated with an underlying porphyry gold system.
receiving the honours for the Hemi discovery in WA’s Pilbara.
Challenger is earning up to 75% in Hualilan, with drilling to date
Estimations are that Hemi could host 3-5 moz gold and De
by the company resulting in extended mineralisation in multiple
Grey’s maiden resource announcement in mid-2021 is highly
directions and confirmed high grades including 6.1m @ 34.6 g/t
anticipated.
gold, 21.9 g/t silver, 2.9% zinc; 6.7m @ 14.3 g/t gold, 140 g/t silver
Hemi sits in a class of its own at the moment, however, the next
and 7.3% zinc.
12 months could well be company-defining for the emerging
The company has had five rigs drilling at Hualilan since
Challenger Exploration Ltd in Argentina and time will tell if both
September, with stratigraphic drilling targeting the intrusion-
company and country become fancied propositions in the market.
hosted system in the Gap zone at Cerro Norte the focus of an
In late 2020, WA and West African gold plays continued to be all
initial 10,000m programme.
the rage on the ASX, however, the appetite for exploration in parts
The next 20,000m of drilling was planned to focus on extension/
of Latin America appears to be returning.
infill work at the Magnata and Sanchez fault (two rigs) where high-
Challenger is one of the companies leading the charge in the
grade assays have been produced by Challenger, while one rig
region and was trading at 20c/share, with a market cap of $120
would be dedicated to extension/infill of manto mineralisation and
million and about $20 million in cash (September 2020) to ramp-
two rigs will be churning away at the underlying intrusion-hosted
up drilling at the high-grade Hualilan gold project in the Tier 1 San
gold discovery.
Juan province, Argentina.
Meanwhile, Challenger hopes to push as many historical ounces
“We’ll be drilling out our first resource and then we’ll have a
into JORC resource as possible through a series of underground
couple of resource upgrades going forward. By next year we’ll
mapping and sampling activities. Assays were expected to be
hopefully have a multi-million ounce deposit in Argentina.
available in the new year.
We’re really beginning to get an understanding of how big it is,”
The level of enthusiasm for gold stories is expected to be
Challenger managing director
sustained throughout 2021, however, Knauer senses a change of
Kris Knauer told GMJ in
attitude from investors in the market.
December.
“In the last month, the market has got a bit tricky and you now
“We have a number of high-
have to have something. You can’t just be a gold company; you
quality Argentinian geologists
have to have some meat on the bones of the story. I still don’t
on the ground and we’ll
think the market understands what we have in Argentina and
probably end up drilling
where it will end up, but at least now we have some recognition
double the 45,000m we’ve
for what we are building over there,” Knauer said.
got planned by the time we
finish as every second hole is “It is a lot bigger than we first thought and there are a lot more
throwing up nice surprises at styles of mineralisation; it is not just the traditional high-grade stuff
the moment.” in the skarn in the limestone. There is high-grade stuff between
the two main lodes, the high-grade stuff can be hosted basically
Although Challenger has anywhere you have open space. Then there is the size of this
planned a 45,000m drilling underlying intrusion-hosted [mineralisation] to be considered. We
programme at Hualilan, the have now pumped a couple of holes down past 500m because
company could easily end up they look like they are still pretty interesting mineralised rocks; it is
doubling the metreage a big system that hadn’t been looked at.”
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