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DIGGeRs & DeALeRs

Stavely set for steady surge

tavely Minerals Ltd executive chairman between Thursday’s Gossan and BHP Gold have all run their ruler over the
SChris Cairns always sensed last year’s Ltd’s Oak Dam discovery over the border ground without any great success.
discovery hole at the Thursday’s Gossan in South Australia, prompting investors to “There’s some big names there and
copper-gold project in western Victoria load up on Stavely shares which ultimately some names well noted for their explora-
would not be his company’s best. peaked at $1.42 in mid-October. tion prowess, but I think the differentiating
“Statistically, you would have to say that Cairns said he was always confident factor between our success and theirs is
our first hole is not going to be our best more high-grade results would follow the that they probably were coming at it from
hole,” Cairns told Paydirt in early June. discovery hole despite the lag time be- that classical porphyry model,” Cairns
Those words proved to be spot on just tween spectacular intercepts being longer said.
a few weeks later when Stavely reported than he had hoped. “They probably didn’t drill enough holes
a fresh intercept of 87m @ 1.74% copper, “It’s true to say that whilst we were put- to recognise that it was different, but we
0.57 g/t and 20 g/t silver from 140m down- ting out some very, very good widths and were able to come in and be more commit-
hole at the newly named Cayley lode. As- grades, the original drill result was yet to be ted in our drilling. It also wasn’t as though
saying also returned individual grades of eclipsed in terms of the very high grades,” we had a portfolio of exploration opportu-
up to 24% copper and 10 g/t gold. he said. nities around the world that were compet-
Shares in Stavely surged 25% on June “Having said that, I’m absolutely confi- ing [for capital]. We had the one asset and
15 when the result was announced to the dent that as we work through this system we were twined relative to the success of
market, including the inference from Cairns – and given that it’s expected to be so ver- that asset.”
that this latest intercept had emulated the tically and laterally extensive and mineral- Cairns and fellow former Integra Mining
discovery hole drilled last September. ised on multiple structures – we will see a directors Peter Ironside, Jennifer Murphy
“Due to the large overall interval of lot more of these quite spectacular grades and the late Bill Plyley acquired the Thurs-
strong copper, gold and silver mineralisa- coming out the other side.” day’s Gossan and Ararat projects off BCD
tion in SMD087 and the significant gold Stavely has been drilling intensely at Resources NL (formerly Beaconsfield
grades in the high-grade sub-intervals, Thursday’s Gossan since raising $19.6 Gold) in 2013 and floated Stavely as an
we consider this intercept to be on a par million on the back of the discovery an- ASX-listed company the following year.
with the assays from discovery drill hole nouncement. That work has helped the As Cairns explained, it was a slow, at
SMD050,” Cairns said. company define shallow mineralisation ex- times frustrating, build-up to last year’s ex-
“It is fair to say we continue to be amazed tending over 1.5km of strike and down to ploration breakthrough.
by the scale of this mineral system and we a depth of about 250m at the Cayley lode, “The fundamental premise for Stavely
may have to contemplate an acceleration named after Geological Survey of Victoria when we first took on the project and then
of our drilling programme to define the full senior geologist Ross Cayley, who was subsequently listed the company was that
extent of the Cayley lode and other min- instrumental in recent efforts to unearth we had hold of a large porphyry complex
eralised structures, including the copper what previous explorers had been unable and we felt that previous explorers simply
lode splay and the north-south structure.” to find. hadn’t drilled deep enough to properly test
Stavely sparked market interest last At the time of print, resource drilling was the potential,” he said.
September when it drilled a mouth-wa- more than 50% complete ahead of a highly “We earmarked a programme of deep-
tering 32m @ 5.88% copper, 1 g/t gold anticipated maiden resource estimate for er drilling initially and as that programme
and 58 g/t silver from 62m down-hole at the Cayley lode during the second half of evolved we started drilling into some por-
Thursday’s Gossan, about 200km west the year. phyry M-veins [magnetite quartz veins]
of Melbourne. Assaying of the same hole Thursday’s Gossan was identified as that looked very, very similar to those at
also returned 12m @ 14.3% copper, 2.26 a promising copper prospect in the early Cadia-Ridgeway. We were quite taken
g/t gold and 145 g/t silver and 2m @ 40% 1970s by American oil company Pensoil. with those and we spent a lot of time and
copper, 3 g/t gold and 517 g/t silver. Since then, the likes of North Ltd, CRA, money chasing those veins to death.
At the time, comparisons were drawn Newcrest Mining Ltd and Beaconsfield “All of that really culminated in August

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