JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – Surface geological analysis and an initial 2 100 m target delineation shallow-vector drilling programme at Aim-listed Papua Mining’s Tripela prospect area, in Papua New Guinea, has indicated broad zones of visible copper mineralisation representing positive indications of projected deeper porphyry copper/gold deposits, the company said on Friday.

Papua currently had 12 exploration licences, comprising about 2 400 km2, in Papau New Guinea, containing three main anomalies, namely the Flying Fox, Junction and Tripela drill targets, in the EL1462 tenement area.

More than 4 000 m of diamond drilling had been completed on these targets, with Tripela having been delineated as Papua’s primary focus in the search for a buried porphyry copper/gold deposit.

The recently completed drilling programme at Tripela had collected essential vectoring geological information to map the alteration halo of the inferred porphyry target, the company said, explaining that these drilling results, combined with the surface discovery of high-grade copper mineralisation in outcrops, pointed to the likely presence of a porphyry nearby.

“We are now in the process of using these results to update the geological model for the target,” Papua said.

In addition, assay results had also been received for rock samples collected at the company’s EL2051 tenement area, located some 20 km north of the Tripela porphyry target, during March and April.

Of the 326 samples collected, 28 samples returned gold values greater than 1 g/t, with a maximum grade of 35.5 g/t having been returned from an outcrop sample.

Following receipt of the assay results, a field team was dispatched to the area to examine the rocks in the anomalous area and carry out confirmatory sampling on the mineralised zone. This team had provisionally reported that its field observations were consistent with the assay results. 

“It is now planned to carry out full and detailed geological mapping as well as geochemical soil sampling on a grid basis, in due course, to trace the extent and tenor of this exciting new mineralised zone,” the company said.