Challenger Exploration (ASX: CEL) has entered into agreements to acquire a package of Exploration Licences adjacent to the company’s existing Hualilan Gold Project in Argentina.
The concessions comprise five contiguous exploration licenses which are collectively called the Cordon del Peñon tenements.
The Cordon del Peñon tenements cover 97.5 square kilometres and are located three kilometres north of Challenger’s existing Hualilan Project concessions which cover approximately 80 square kilometres.
The tenements are bounded by Newmont on the eastern and southern boundaries.
Managing Director, Kris Knauer, said they contain the same package of sedimentary rocks and limestones which host the Hualilan Gold project and cover approximately 15 kilometres of prospective strike.
“Hualilan has emerged as a discovery of significance, and it is rare for a discovery the scale of Hualilan to be the only gold deposit in a district. Prior to Challenger acquiring Hualilan, both the Hualilan Gold Project, and the entire surrounding area, had received only cursory exploration in the previous 15 years,” Mr Knauer said.
“This acquisition is part of our strategy of being the first mover to control a district scale land package around Hualilan. We feel the entire greater Hualilan area is significantly under-explored and see no reason why it cannot host additional Hualilan style discoveries. Given the knowledge we have from Hualilan itself, we feel Challenger is the best placed to unlock the potential of the Hualilan District.”
The most recent historical work was done on the tenements in 2017 prior to the company’s Hualilan Gold Project emerging as a discovery of significance. This work was completed by TSX listed Centenera Mining Corporation and involved the collection of 110 stream sediment samples and 26 rock chip samples across the concession.
Two of the stream sediment samples assayed 2.3 g/t (2,300ppb) gold and 2.2 g/t (2,219ppb) gold, which is exceptionally high for stream sediment samples. This was interpreted by Centenera as suggesting the presence of a proximal gold source. The two high-grade samples are supported by additional stream sediment samples which define four discrete gold geochemical targets within a zone of anomalous geochemistry over approximately 10km strike length. These stream sediment samples and rock chip sample results were never followed up and the source has not been identified.
As a first step in exploration, the company intends to expand its ground magnetic data to cover the entire 97.5 square kilometres of the new concessions and follow up areas of anomalous surface geochemistry with ground geological mapping to identify the source of the mineralisation.
The concession will subsequently be integrated with Challenger’s existing exploration programme evaluating targets away from the main three kilometre mineralised zones at Hualilan.
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