The company reported a major mineralised zone dubbed “Savannah North”, which is interpreted to be in the most likely offset position of the Savannah intrusion host rock.

The first drillhole of a new program of deep exploration at the site returned 89.3m at 1.6% nickel, 0.76% copper and 0.12% cobalt from 704.9m.

It includes 13.2m at 2.1% nickel from 741.8m and 17m at 2.28% nickel at 777m.

The company said the discovery confirmed its exploration model at the mine, which is evaluating the faulted offset of the Savannah orebody below the 900m mark.

The first hole intersected a broad zone of typical Savannah-style magmatic breccia-textured massive sulphide mineralisation and has an anticipated downhole completion depth of 100-1100m.

Several follow-up holes are planned to be drilled as part of the program over the next few months, including two to three strategically positioned surface holes further to the north.

“This is a potential game changer for the Savannah project and the company and is a testament to the skills and dedication of our geology team led by John Hicks, general manager exploration,” Panoramic managing director Peter Harold said.

“The initial Savannah North results are very exciting and opened up a previously unexplored area and further positive drill results could have a significant impact on the mine life of the Savannah project, subject to commodity prices and other economic factors.”

Deeper expansion of Savannah is hoped to extend operations past 2017 and allow the mine to extend production leveraging existing infrastructure and equipment.

Drilling at the 900m fault area is expected to continue over the next 12 months.

Savannah is located in WA’s east Kimberley region and holds a reserve of 2 million tonnes grading 1.3% nickel for 37,900 tonnes of nickel metal.

Shares in Panoramic were last trading 74.5% higher at A41c.