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Doug Bright
True North Copper has fired up the rigs at its Mt Oxide project in northwest Queensland, launching a new combined drilling campaign to expand the company’s Aquila copper-cobalt-silver discovery.
The phase one program will drill 6000m across 23 holes, comprising 18 reverse circulation (RC) holes and five diamond holes, with Aquila the priority target.
Previous drilling at Aquila delivered thick, punchy hits, including 145m at 0.75 per cent copper, 0.12 per cent cobalt and 2.9 grams per tonne (g/t) silver from 28m in one hole. A second hole delivered 59m at 1.77 per cent copper, 0.04 per cent cobalt and 5.2g/t silver from 134m.
Aquila sits within a well-defined copper, cobalt and silver corridor stretching for more than 10km and linking into the established Vero resource, 4km to the southwest.
‘Phase 1 of the 2026 program is focused on building out and extending the Aquila discovery.’
True North Copper managing director Andrew Mooney
Vero is a high-grade copper-silver-cobalt deposit with 15.03 million tonnes grading 1.46 per cent copper and 10.59g/t silver, including a cobalt resource of 9.15 million tonnes at 0.23 per cent cobalt.
Vero’s copper and silver inventory equates to 220,000 tonnes of copper and 5 million ounces of silver, with high-grade, continuous mineralisation extending to at least 250m below surface.
True North says the diamond drilling will help sharpen its understanding of the structural controls on mineralisation at Aquila and support modelling and future development studies. The RC drilling will test down-dip and along-strike extensions.
With Aquila, the current headline act and Vero providing an established resource base, True North reckons the Mt Oxide district is shaping up as the region’s biggest and highest-grade greenfield copper find in more than 20 years, with potential to stand alone as a sulphide development asset.
True North Copper managing director Andrew Mooney said: “The 2025 Aquila discovery has fundamentally improved our view of Mt Oxide, confirming the potential for a large scale copper-cobalt-silver system building on the existing Vero Resource.”
Importantly, both Aquila and Vero host high-grade shoots that remain open at depth and along strike, keeping plenty of blue sky in the system as the company steps out with each program.
True North first flagged the Aquila discovery mid-last year after its maiden RC program delivered significant mineralisation and opened up a new target area within the broader Mt Oxide corridor.
Since then, drilling and geophysics have pushed the mineralised trend to more than 1.3km, within a structural corridor offering more than 10km of prospectivity and multiple high-priority targets.
Two other prospects, Acanthis and Apollo, sit on parallel trends on either side of Aquila and add more follow-up options as the company works along the corridor.
With that target pipeline in mind, the phase one program is set to run through April to June or July, with assay results folded into updated models as they land. A phase two program later in 2026 is expected to keep the momentum rolling.
Management plans to use results from induced polarisation geophysics and geochemistry to fine-tune phase two, stepping out further from Aquila, drilling Vero extensions and testing regional prospects, including Rhea, Apollo and Acanthis.
True North’s new campaign follows a move two weeks ago to tighten its grip on the Cloncurry district, after agreeing to buy Renegade Exploration’s 22.5 per cent interest in the Carpentaria joint venture (JV).
The company’s binding agreement to acquire the Carpentaria JV share also includes a 35 per cent interest in the key Mongoose tenement, with an inferred resource of 3.1 million tonnes grading 0.55 per cent copper and 0.07g/t gold.
Global miner Glencore, through its wholly owned subsidiary, Mount Isa Mines, remains the joint venture’s senior partner, with a 77.5 per cent stake and has a 40-day right of first refusal to match the deal.
True North’s wholly owned Cloncurry copper project, meanwhile, includes the Taipan deposit and sits immediately alongside the Carpentaria joint venture, separated from it by a tenement boundary.
By buying Renegade’s interest, True North aims to bring Mongoose and Taipan under a more integrated development plan, potentially allowing a larger, optimised open pit at Cloncurry once the deal is completed.
With drill rods turning and phase two plans taking shape, True North looks set for a steady run of news through mid-year as it chases its next step-up in scale at Mt Oxide.
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