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- Metals explorer Liontown Resources (LTR) has completed preliminary exploration work at its solely-owned Moora nickel project in WA
- Moora is located in the same type of geological terrain as Chalice Gold’s recent Julimar discovery, which hosts a rich Ni-Cu-PGE mineralisation
- Historically, Moora has been probed a few times but only at the surface or via shallow drilling, Liontown will be the first to drill into unweathered bedrock
- Liontown has already completed a gravity survey and auger sampling program and results are currently pending
- Once these results are received, Liontown can proceed with a more extensive program of drilling and magnetic surveys to define the mineralised intrusions
- Liontown Resources will open Thursday’s session with shares priced at 9.1 cents each
Metals explorer Liontown Resources (LTR) has completed preliminary exploration work at its solely-owned Moora nickel project in WA.
The Moora Project
Moora is located in the same type of geological terrain as Chalice Gold’s recently announced Julimar discovery, 95 kilometres to the south, which hosts a high-grade nickel-copper and platinum group element deposit (Ni-Cu-PGE).
Limited historic exploration has already identified significant Ni-Cu-PGE and gold anomalism at Moora, but Liontown will be the first to test the unweathered bedrock, seeking the mineral-rich mafic and ultramafic intrusions which host the precious resources.
Liontown currently holds three adjacent exploration licenses in the area, covering 467 square kilometres. The company has engaged Armada Exploration Services to further exploration work at the site, and will pay Armada $1 million, as well as 0.5 per cent of net smelter returns if an exploitable resource is identified and mined.
Historically, Moora has been probed a few times, but only at the surface or via shallow drilling. Strong evidence of nickel and copper mineralisation go back as far as 1968, but a succession of explorers have left the site alone despite the evidence due to extraneous circumstances.
Liontown now has the chance to fully understand and exploit what’s in the ground at Moora.
Exploration
The site at Moora is ancient — eons of erosion have led the mineralised rock to become weathered, with thick layers of sediment above the bedrock. Geophysical surveys will be needed to map the mafic and ultramafic intrusions in the rock which hold the resources.
Liontown has already completed a gravity survey and auger sampling program and results are currently pending. The company also completed the first-ever field assessment of the large gravity anomalies underlying the western part of the project area.
Once these results are received, Liontown can proceed with a more extensive program of drilling and magnetic surveys to define the mineralised intrusions which host the Ni-Cu-PGE deposits.
When those targets are identified, a deeper and more extensive reverse circulation and diamond core drilling program will be used to define and refine resource estimates.
If Moora proves to host similar intrusions to Julimar, Liontown could indeed be onto a good thing. The burgeoning electric vehicle market is hungry for nickel, and Moora could prove to be valuable fodder for the beast.
Liontown Resources will open Thursday’s session with shares priced at 9.1 cents each.
