Carnaby Resources has announced a new copper-gold rich discovery at Mount Hope after water bore work fortuitously struck a high-grade shoot.

It delivered an intersection of 232m at 1.3 per cent CuEq (1.1 per cent copper and 0.2g/t gold from surface including 65m at 2.9 per cent CuEq (2.4 per cent copper and 0.5g/t gold) from 5m downhole.

The Miniboom discovery at Mount Hope reinforces the exploration upside throughout the Greater Duchess Project, according to Carnaby Resources (ASX: CNB) managing director Rob Watkins.

It came through a hole targeted primarily as a water bore on the edge of the planned Mount Hope Central open pit, he said

“Mount Hope is strongly controlled and hosted in folded and structurally displaced quartz vein lode hosts in multiple orientations,” Mr Watkins said.

“This means that new lodes are easy to miss in directed drilling, however equally there are likely more to be found.

“Thankfully the water bore didn’t intersect a lot of water. Further drilling is underway to understand the significance of this discovery and potential impact on the size of the Mount Hope Central open pit given its proximity to the planned open pit edge.”

The company said the top 15m of the Miniboom discovery hole intersected what was suspected to be mineralised mullock.

It was believed that the Miniboom lode may have been mined at the turn of the century or in the late 1960s to early 1970s before being backfilled with mullock from the main Boomerang lode historical open pit.

There is little documented history or photos of the shallow open-pit mining that previously took place at Mount Hope.

Related: Strong results flow from Trekelano footwall lode

Carnaby is continuing to drill out the recent Trek 1 footwall lode discovery at Trekelano and now the Miniboom lode discovery ahead of updating the Trek 1, Trek 2 and Mount Hope mineral resource estimates. This will enable a re-optimisation of the ore reserve open pits.

Mr Watkins said Carnaby remained on track to complete its Greater Duchess Project feasibility study mid-year prior to FID and targeted first ore production by the end of 2026.