The company has intersected a 2m wide quartz reef with visible gold in a drill hole 900m below surface level, 200m below the old mining areas. Gold assay results for the intersection were 66 grams per tonne.
The Swan Decline, which is currently proceeding from 500m vertical (3200m in length) to 700m vertical (4300m in total), has also intersected a reef in the Deborah Syncline between the Deborah and Sheepshead Anticlines.
“These results support the theory which underpins the New Bendigo 10 million ounce resource potential,” Bendigo’s managing director Douglas Buerger said.
“The first result is exciting because we predicted there would be a ribbon at 900m, we drilled a hole and bingo, there it was.
“And the second result is exciting because usually in the syncline you would not expect to find gold. Finding mineralisation in the syncline is an added bonus.
“The grades are not all that significant because of the nuggety nature of gold in Bendigo.”
Buerger said the 10Moz resource identified within the New Bendigo was restricted to anticlines and the identification of mineralisation further highlights the exploration potential within the Bendigo Goldfields.
The reef in the syncline is 3m thick, well mineralised with sulphides and returned channel samples of up to 1.3m at 7.6gpt gold.
Earlier this month Bendigo reported intersecting an unmined ribbon on the new Chum line of a ribbon 6km to the north of the Swan decline.
Drilling is continuing to test the new Chum line of reef for new ribbons down to 1500 metres depth on a section 4km north of the Swan decline.
These latest results match previously successful intersections at the Deborah line of reef, 250m beneath the main historic workings and at the Sheepshead line of reef intersected about 300m below the historically mined S2 ribbon.
Market support is vital to the survival of the New Bendigo project. The current exploration bill totals $42 million and the company estimates it will cost $70-100 million to bring the project to its next stage of development.
Bendigo currently has $18 million in its coffers, so the company may have to look to the market to generate more capital to continue its exploration.
