Modern Mining March 2019

MINING News

Gonka to be incorporated into Yanfolila mine plan

Tanga signs agreement on Namibian properties Tanga Resources, listed on the ASX, has signed a binding agreement with Epangelo Mining (Pty) Ltd to earn an initial equity interest of 80 % in a portfolio of exploration licences located in Namibia. Epangelo is a private company with the Namibian government as its sole shareholder. It was established to ensure national participation in the discovery, exploitation and beneficiation of Namibia’s mineral resources whilst developing and consolidating a portfolio of high quality assets and services for the benefit of its stakeholders. The licences are located on the Damara Orogenic Belt in central northern Namibia, immediately south of Tanga’s Hagenhof copper- cobalt project and will significantly expand Tanga’s total regional land position to over 1 700 km 2 . Although a number of historic regional copper and gold occur- rences are reported on the licences, there has been very little modern exploration. Regional aeromagnetic data, however, shows a major north-south trending structure running through one of the licences, EPL 4833, and continuing up into Hagenhof.  Hummingbird Resources, listed on AIM, has announced its third set of drilling results from the recently completed exploration campaign at the Yanfolila gold mine in Mali, the main focus of which was to convert resources to reserves and, in time, extend the mine life. The completed drilling programme largely focused around the resource definition at the Gonka deposit, with some further follow up drilling at Komana West. Hummingbird says that the latest results demonstrate more high-grade potential and continued exploration potential at depth. Additionally, in December 2018, the company announced a set of high-grade results, of which the stand-out intercept was 15 m at 16,03 g/t. Hummingbird is now focused on integrating the positive results seen in its exploration programme into its mine plan. The Gonka deposit is situated just 5 km from the process plant, making it suitable to be included in the current mine plan. The deposit is fully permitted and within the mining licence, which will allow mining to start imme- diately once the resource modelling and mine planning is completed. Murray Paterson, Chief Geologist for Hummingbird, commented: “Following the conclusion of the drilling programme at Gonka, we have moved to the resource modelling phase as we look to publish a new and updated mineral resource for Gonka and the open pittable reserves. After this is completed, the company plans to release a new life of mine plan at Yanfolila. “Our exploration team is reviewing the Gonka drilling data and is planning ahead for the coming 2019 drilling programme, which will target the down dip extensions to Gonka to expand the resource and reserves. A thorough review of the database to identify new green- field targets is also underway and this is expected to yield high priority targets to drill test outside the current seven deposits that have resources associated with them.” 

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