Falconbridge zeros in on high-grade sulphides

A high-grade base metals discovery in the Sudbury igneous complex of northern Ontario has prompted Falconbridge (FL-T) to accelerate drilling.

By January, the major plans to have three rigs chasing the zone, which lies 2.7 km north of the city’s airport. Borehole geophysics suggest it continues to the north, east and south.

Mineralization is hosted by the complex’s main contact layer and underlying footwall rocks of brecciated granodiorite and Sudbury breccia.

In the contact zone, hole 100A cut 6.4 metres (starting at a down-hole depth of 1,439 metres) running 2.36% nickel and 1.79% copper. Platinum, palladium and gold values have yet to be reported.

Farther down-hole, five intervals were cut in the footwall rocks. The sections occur between core depths of 1,577 and 1,663 metres, starting with 6.5 metres averaging 0.52% nickel, 7.12% copper, 1.24 grams platinum, 0.42 gram palladium and 0.29 gram gold per tonne, and ending with 6.15 metres averaging 2.26% nickel, 17.49% copper, 19.57 grams platinum, 26.34 grams palladium and 20.49 grams gold. The longest interval was 9.65 metres and averaged 3.43% nickel, 12.13% copper, 3.85 grams platinum, 3.13 grams palladium and 8.3 grams gold.

Hole 100A was wedged off hole 100 at a depth of 800 metres to the east, at 75 to horizontal. The original hole returned two intervals of 0.1 metre (at 1,443 metres down-hole) grading 1.89% copper and 0.71% nickel and 0.3 metre (at 1,561 metres) of 0.26% nickel and 20.30% copper. Both are 75-124 metres away from those intersected by the wedge hole.

Lakefield Research assayed the core from both holes.

Falconbridge notes that the new zone sits 2 km southeast of its Rim depost, where inferred resources stand at 1.6 million tonnes grading 1.6% nickel, 10.1% copper, 4.2 grams platinum, 3.5 grams palladium and 2.5 grams gold per tonne.