LSE-listed Kavango Resources has started drilling at the first of its three targets in the Kalahari Suture Zone (KSZ) in Botswana.
The objective of the drilling is to verify the company’s geological model, aimed at discovering a Norilsk-style magmatic sulphide orebody.
The company selected its current three drill targets following two airborne electro-magnetic (AEM) surveys on its prospecting licences and the subsequent ground-based geophysical follow-up surveys and soil sampling. The soil sampling tested for iron, copper and zinc.
The about 1 000 m drilling programme will seek to intersect sulphide mineralisation associated with gabbroic sills that were intruded into the Karoo sediments about 180-million years ago.
Kavango believes the presence of copper/nickel sulphide mineralisation, in association with high-level gabbroic sills, will provide significant evidence for the development of magmatic sulphide orebodies similar to those currently being mined at Norilsk, in Russia, and Voisey’s Bay, in Canada.
Kavango has elected to use reverse circulation drilling, which is more cost effective, to penetrate the relatively unconsolidated Kalahari and Karoo cover for up to 200 m.
Diamond core drilling will then continue into Karoo sediments, gabbros and the conductive targets to a target depth of around 400 m.
“We are delighted that the drilling on the first hole of this three-hole programme is now under way.
“If the current drilling is able to verify Kavango's geological model by intersecting metal sulphide mineralisation in association with gabbroic intrusives on the KSZ, this will represent a major step forward towards the discovery of a world-class, Norilsk-type, magmatic sulphide deposit in Botswana,” Kavango CEO Michael Foster commented in a statement issued on Tuesday.