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Murray Ward
Kaiser Reef has fired up a major multi-pronged exploration and development assault at its Maldon gold project in Victoria.
The work is being spearheaded by the official launch of underground decline refurbishment at its fully permitted Union Hill mine, along with a fresh drilling blitz across several high-grade targets.
Whilst rehabilitating Union Hill, stripping development will be used to carve out a fresh northern access drilling platform 250 metres down the decline.
Diamond drilling is locked in to kick off next quarter, handing the company the ultimate vantage point to test unexplored and untested portions of the highly prospective, parallel Eaglehawk and Ladies reefs beneath the current mine.
‘It’s exciting to be back working underground at Maldon, and it’s another milestone for Kaiser Reef.’
Kaiser Reef managing director Brad Valiukas
Also, at the front and centre of the company’s aggressive exploration campaign is a brand-new target, dubbed Quill, next to its Porcupine Flat processing plant.
The hotspot was first picked up after a 1090-metre sterilisation aircore drilling program for a new tailings dam hit 8m running at 4.16 grams per tonne (g/t) gold from 10m, including a high-grade core of 2m grading a hefty 9.90g/t gold from 11m.
Kaiser says it has since followed up on those results with an electrical resistivity survey, which has identified a prominent quartz reef target directly beneath this mineralisation, now slated for immediate reverse-circulation drilling.
Meanwhile, a regional phase-one soil survey tracking across 2.7 square kilometres of previously unsampled ground at Maldon North has uncovered a significant 850m north-north-west gold trend running west of the Cumberland Line, one of the multiple historical high-grade quartz veins and lines of workings in the Maldon goldfield.
Kaiser says the survey has successfully extended gold anomalism across the full 4.4-kilometre strike of the mining licence, with tight 40m by 40m phase-two infill soil sampling already underway to refine anomalies and disturbed areas from old workings into definitive drill targets.
Maldon represents a district-scale gold opportunity with numerous historical workings that remain substantially underexplored, despite having historically produced 1.75 million ounces of gold at an enviable 28 grams per tonne (g/t).
Kaiser Reef managing director Brad Valiukas said: “Kaiser is a profitable gold miner with a robust balance sheet and a strong pipeline of exploration and development opportunities. We are well-positioned to both capitalise on a strong gold price and add significant further value to our assets with targeted investment.”
The company’s next major exploration milestone kicks off at Nuggetty South in late June, with a diamond drilling contractor appointed to target a compelling 170m untested gap along a newly unlocked shallow plunge.
Historical drilling along this plunge has returned exceptional hits, including 3.4m at 34.0g/t gold 175m south of the Nuggety shaft, with a further hole featuring 4.3m at 11.2g/t gold 470m south of the old shaft.
Kaiser says it’s hunting a replica of the historic adjacent Nuggetty Reef, which produced 301,000 ounces of the yellow metal at an eye-popping average grade of 187g/t.
The company’s fresh underground exploration push is being supported by an expanded 24-hour processing shift at the Porcupine Flat plant, which is currently chewing through a low-grade stockpile of 570,000 tonnes grading 0.48 g/t gold for 8600 ounces. The expanded shift is set to lower processing costs whilst helping Kaiser self-fund exploration.
With the drill rods about to start spinning and the processing cranking up at its Maldon project, alongside a hefty $45.6 million cash war chest ready to deploy, Kaiser looks primed to make a splash in the Victorian goldfields this year.
Punters will likely be keeping their eyes peeled for the first of the assay results when they start landing.
Is your ASX-listed company doing something interesting? Contact: mattbirney@bullsnbears.com.au
