FRONTIER Resources Limited has announced an aggressive upcoming fieldwork on the historic Tolukuma tenement.
The conpany’s plans include geological mapping, soil rock and trench sampling to determine the extents of near mine prospects at the Saki, Kimono North and Kunda North gold vein systems.
First gold was originally poured at Tolukuma in December 1995 by Dome Resources. Durban Roodepoort Deep Ltd (DP), subsequent owners and operators of Tolukuma Gold mines (TGM), continued mining in year 2000 with a reserve of 560,000t @ 17g/t Au with 298,000 ounces contained gold.
Mining subsequently continued in 2001 with a gold price of US$280/oz. In 2002 road construction commenced to access the mine from the highway at Tapini. Road access to the Saki gold vein system was also proposed via Woitape village as part of their expansion plan of developing additional gold resources more cost effectively.
At that time, the DP cash costs were A$331/oz. DP also planned for an expanded mining lease over its near mine gold prospects; an area that is now encompassed by Frontier’s EL2531 tenement.
Today, the original mining lease ML104 is currently undergoing a tendering process to attract investment with the objective to re-commence production. EL2531 will become increasingly important for both parties, requiring road access to the mine and additional gold/base metal prospects that warrant further exploration.
Three gold vein systems have been identified on the Tolukuma tenement EL2531 for follow-up sampling including Kimono North, Taula North and the Saki system of gold bearing veins. These areas were historically identified as most likely to provide additional gold resources to the Tolukuma mine.
Planned fieldwork at Saki aims to identify additional drilling targets by extending historical trenching programmes to test for continuity and length of the known gold veins.
Trench sampling results along the Kimono vein include 1m @ 30.10g/t Au & 1m @ 17.80g/t Au in Outcrop #5 and 6.68g/t Au in Outcrop #2. The vein occurs 800m from the Tolukuma mill and further trench mapping and sampling are planned to define its interpreted 3km strike length (Refer ASX Announcement 22/11/2019).
Trench sampling results at the Taula North vein include 1.2m @ 1,041.20g/t Au and spot trench samples of 332g/t, 33.10g/t and 29.40g/t Au a further 750m to the northwest. Additional trench sampling is planned to track the continuity of gold mineralisation (refer ASX Announcement 5/9/2019).
Data compilation will continue to evaluate the potential of additional prospects, including at Soju/Sindove where seven holes were drilled for 1,044m.
