Arc Minerals announced the commencement of its maiden exploration programme at its Virgo project in Botswana, and reported that a soil geochemistry survey was currently underway with an exploratory drill programme to follow.
The mining firm said reinterpretation of the geology in licence PL 135/2017 suggested the existence of a fold crest, presenting an opportunity to extend the previous soil sampling grid along the fold limb to the crest.
Arc Minerals noted that both the PL 135/2017 and PL 162/2017 licence areas hosted the contact between Ngwako Pan and D’Kar formations, which are favourable for hosting copper-silver mineralisation.
The group commented that the historically sampled areas within the two licences indicated DKF-NPF contact, with further sampling set to assist efforts to zone in on this contact.
Arc Minerals said its exploration drilling would follow further sampling to test DKF-NPF contact zone areas and interpreted fold crest targeting the identified and new anomalies that may be produced by the soil geochemistry survey.
“Following the acquisition of Alvis-Crest (Propriety) Limited late last year the team has reviewed the previous work carried out in the respective license areas and put forward our maiden exploration programme to further refine our geological understanding before commencing with an exploratory drill programme,” said Arc Minerals executive chairman Nick von Schirnding.
“These licenses lie within and adjacent to the highly prospective Central Structural Corridor of the Kalahari Copper Belt (“KCB”) and within 10km and 50km of Khomecau’s Zone 5 and Banana Zone copper projects respectively, known as the two largest copper projects on the KCB.”
“Further these licenses already host two known copper-nickel anomalies, both 2-3km in length overlying the favourable interpreted DKF-NPF contact that have yet to be drill tested and now potentially may have further targets. This is an extremely exciting time for the Company and these license areas.”