Mantle hits broad nickel ahead of WA resource estimate

Fresh assays from a phase two RC drilling program at Mantle Minerals’ Highway deposit, part of the larger Pardoo nickel project near Port Hedland in WA’s Pilbara region have delivered several broad intercepts including 68m at 0.44 per cent nickel from 57m. The company believes the results validate the results of a phase one campaign and position it in a solid position to plan for a resource estimate in the first quarter of the year.

Additional results include 24m grading 0.43 per cent nickel from 138m, 24m running 0.41 nickel from 176m and 81m going 0.39 per cent nickel from 102m. A longer strike stretched 111m and took in a grade of 0.37 per cent nickel from a depth of 159m. Mantle says the site’s mineralisation remains open both along strike and at depth.

The Perth-based company argues the program’s results, in addition to data from earlier campaigns, indicate the zone’s mineralisation swells towards the southern extensions of its current nickel envelope. The results also highlight excellent potential for more mineralisation towards the north.

Mantle believes the probe has provided a solid set of results to kick its delivery of a JORC 2012 resource estimate along and now plans to sniff out nickel sulphide mineralisation in other zones within its tenements.

The latest activity follows a 20-hole, 4000m-plus RC drilling campaign at its Highway nickel-cobalt-copper-palladium deposit in September last year which was intended to collect metallurgical and geological data ahead of a 2023 mineral resource estimate. The program aimed to fill the gaps between a historically open-pitiable zone at the site and identify down-dip extensions to the deposit’s mineralisation.

Mantle’s phase two program came off the back of an April 2022 foray that management branded enormously fruitful. Phase one included 14 RC holes and was used to substantiate legacy nickel strikes and review the ground’s platinum group metal potential. The work followed a suite of compelling results by CRA Exploration, now flying under the Rio Tinto banner, in the early 1990s. Back then the nickel price hovered around the US$2500 per tonne mark, meaning a broad intercept of 89m at a humble 0.37 per cent nickel grade didn’t warrant a second look. With the price of the commodity now trading at about US$27,000 per tonne those sorts of results appear much more appealing for Mantle.

The company says its Pardoo tenure boasts analogous geological characteristics to several other significant nickel-copper plays in the Pilbara including Artemis Resources’ Radio Hill project which houses a 4 million tonne nickel-copper sulphide resource at 0.51 per cent nickel and 0.88 per cent copper.

Is your ASX-listed company doing something interesting? Contact: matt.birney@wanews.com.au