Monax Mining Limited announced that it had identified a significant new chargeability anomaly, which may represent a newly discovered manganese horizon, at its Polinga Manganese Prospect, which forms part of the Company's Waddikee Project on Eyre Peninsula in South Australia. The anomaly was detected during an expanded Gradient Array Induced Polarization survey the Company undertook after an original GAIP survey, planned to include only the area at Polinga where previous drilling was undertaken by Monax, uncovered a significant chargeability anomaly on the northern boundary of the survey.
Monax decided to expand the GAIP survey northwards to further define the data it had collected prior to the current IP survey, Monax's drilling to date had yet to define a coherent body of manganese mineralization at Polinga. The initial drilling was based on mapping and sampling of manganese float within cultivated paddocks.
The expanded IP survey has now clearly defined two major bedrock chargeable features which may represent manganese mineralization, significantly enhancing the potential of the area.
Hole PRC03, located within the southernmost chargeability feature, reported two intersections of manganese (6m @ 12.5% Mn and 7m @ 15.2% Mn). Hole PRC10 reported 14m @ 10.8% Mn. Holes PRC04 and PRC11 are located on the margins of the chargeability features and report low grade intercepts of manganese. Intersections of >5m @ >14% Mn are considered potentially economically exploitable, should enough volume be identified.
Mr Gary Ferris MD of Monax Mining said that "The new anomaly defined to the north of the previous drilling at Polinga represents a genuine target for manganese, and the next phase of drilling will target this feature. The correlation between the previous drilling and the new IP data provides encouragement that this newly defined anomaly could potentially represent a new manganese horizon."
He said that "The previous IP survey at our Hodgins Prospect successfully showed the high grade manganese intersected in the drilling undertaken in April 2011 correlated with the GAIP chargeability response, providing a level of confidence for the new anomaly at Polinga."
Mr Ferris said that drilling is planned to commence in late February 2012 based on the results of the IP surveys, with separate drilling programs scheduled for Monax's Hodgins, Jamieson Tank and Polinga prospects. The GAIP survey at Jamieson Tank was only partially completed in December 2011, delayed by the late harvest of wheat crops as a result of unseasonal wet weather. The IP crew recommenced the survey at Jamieson Tank today and the survey will be completed by mid January 2012.
The Waddikee Project is the subject of a farm in agreement with OM (Manganese) Limited, a wholly owned subsidiary of OM Holdings Limited. OMM is required to fund AUD 2 million over four years to acquire a 60% participating interest for manganese and iron discovered within the project.
