Early drilling results point to a large mineral system at Canyon prospect, near Austral Resources Australia’s Mount Kelly processing facility in North-West Queensland.

The company said it had intercepted copper oxide over 1.2km of strike, with mineralisation open in multiple directions at the newly granted tenement (EPM 28881).

Initial assay highlights include the following:

• MTKC0713: 29m at 0.36 per cent copper (from 48m, as oxide)
• MTKC0734: 24m at 1.03 per cent copper (from 74m, as oxide), including 14m at 1.6 per cent copper
• MTKC0708: 57m at 0.44 per cent copper (from 4m, as oxide)

“These initial results demonstrate the quality of opportunities surrounding our existing Mount Kelly infrastructure,” Austral Resources Australia (ASX:AR1) chairman David Newling said.

“While the grades and widths are encouraging, what makes Canyon particularly compelling is its location. We’ve identified a large copper oxide system less than 4km from our Mount Kelly processing facility, with mineralisation already defined over more than 1.2km and remaining open in multiple directions.

“Discoveries of this scale and proximity to existing infrastructure are uncommon. Rather than requiring significant investment in new processing facilities or long haulage distances, Canyon has the potential to leverage infrastructure already in place at Mount Kelly.

“As we continue to define the size and continuity of the system, this creates a potential pathway to future feed for the operation and reinforces our strategy of growing copper inventories around our existing infrastructure.”

The results demonstrated the success of the company’s renewed exploration focus on identifying opportunities that could deliver geological scale and potential commercial advantages, he said.

Austral said much of the mineralisation at Canyon was concealed beneath transported cover and silcrete, suggesting historical surface exploration techniques may have underestimated the scale of the system.

Geological observations indicate that mineralisation is consistent with a sediment-hosted copper style, a deposit type capable of forming extensive mineralised systems.