COMPLETION OF PRELIMINARY EVALUATION DRILLING AT MKUSHI
News Report
23 November 2005
African Eagle Resources plc ("the Company" or "African Eagle", ticker AFE) is pleased to announce the remaining results from the preliminary evaluation drilling at its Mkushi copper project in central Zambia. Mineralised drill intercepts included:
| 14.4m at 0.8% copper
37.0m at 0.5% copper including 5m at 2.1% Cu with 0.26 g/t gold 11.6m at 0.9% copper 4.1m at 2.7% copper with 0.1 g/t gold. |
These intercepts, together with the results of new geophysical surveys by African Eagle and the drill results previously announced by the Company on 14 June 2005 and 23 August 2005, demonstrate that the area contains several discrete copper deposits, each extending over a strike length of several hundred metres. All the significant drill intercepts to date are tabulated below.
African Eagle's Directors believe that these copper deposits have the potential to be brought into production quickly and operated profitably, provided that a sufficient global resource can be defined. The Company has begun a programme of definition drilling to quantify the resource to current industry standards (JORC), together with exploration drilling to test promising geophysical anomalies in previously unexplored parts of the prospecting licence.
The Company will also commission a scoping study to investigate the practicalities and economics of taking the project into production. The study will entail metallurgical test work on mineralised drill core followed by preliminary plant design and budgetary costing.
African Eagle's Operations Director, Chris Davies, comments, "The results of our preliminary drilling support the Company's belief that there is potential for the copper deposits in the Mkushi licence to be developed commercially. Moreover, the latest geophysical results suggest that the exploration potential of the wider Mkushi area is substantial".
Background information
Copper was discovered at Mkushi in the 1920s. The copper mineralisation forms several bodies spread over a strike length of 10 to 15 kilometres. Of these, the Mtuga ore body was mined underground in the 1920's and the Munshiwemba ore body was mined by open pit in the 1960s and 70s.
In 1990 the Zambian state copper company ZCCM estimated that the remaining resources amounted to 30 million tonnes averaging 1.23% copper, equivalent to 370,000 tonnes of contained copper metal. However, this estimate cannot now be independently verified and was not made to the JORC resource reporting standards which have since been adopted by the industry.
Early indications suggest that the mineralogy of the deposits is simple and unlikely to present any processing difficulties. The deposits' proximity to one another should permit the use of a central processing plant.
The area enjoys a favourable location near road and rail links, a good water supply, an air strip and a major power line.
Exploration summary
The latest results conclude African Eagle's preliminary exploration drilling at Mkushi. The programme, of 20 inclined diamond drill holes for a total of 3,031 metres, was designed to verify four of the copper deposits documented in old archive reports and to locate additional resources. Most of the holes were "twins" of mineralised drill holes completed in the 1960s. The table below shows all significant mineralised intercepts to date.
In addition to the drilling, the Company is conducting induced polarisation (IP) and gravity geophysical surveys over the area. The results of the IP work to date show several areas of high chargeability, suggesting the presence of additional copper deposits. A map showing these results can be seen at www.africaneagle.co.uk/projects-mkushi.html.
The Company has also evaluated the possibility of reprocessing of the tailings dumps from earlier mining but the copper grade of the tailings is too low. However, this does indicate that even in the 1920's the recovery of copper from the ores was high and thus that the ore processing is likely to be straightforward.
|
Drill Hole |
Prospect |
From (m) |
Interval (m) |
Copper % |
|
MC1 |
Coloquo |
35.5 |
16.7 |
1.5 |
|
MC2 |
Coloquo |
75.6 |
12.5 |
0.7 |
|
MC3 |
Coloquo |
54.0 |
5.3 |
0.5 |
|
MC4 |
Coloquo |
42.5 |
24.3 |
0.7 |
|
MC5 |
Coloquo |
60.1 |
33.1 |
1.9 |
|
MC6 |
Coloquo |
51.4 |
16.8 |
2.4 |
|
MH1 |
H Zone |
21.8 |
57.9 |
0.3 |
|
MH2 |
H Zone |
74.8 |
39.5 |
1.2 |
|
MH3 |
H Zone |
25.6 |
70.4 |
0.8 |
|
MH4 |
H Zone |
75.1 |
53.1 |
0.7 |
|
MH5 |
H Zone |
41.7 |
13.6 |
1.3 |
|
MH6 |
H Zone |
34.7 |
18.0 |
1.3 |
|
MH7 |
H Zone |
48.8 |
109.5 |
0.5 |
|
MMT1* |
Mtuga |
41.7 |
14.4 |
0.8 |
|
MMT2* |
Mtuga |
40.5 |
37.0 |
0.5 |
|
MMU1* |
Munshimwemba |
86.7 |
11.6 |
0.9 |
|
MMU2* |
Munshimwemba |
3.5 |
4.1 |
2.7 |
|
MMU4* |
Munshimwemba |
59.0 |
1.3 |
1.8 |
* new results, November 2005
John Park
Chairman
African Eagle Resources plc