LinQ Minerals has reported broad, shallow copper-gold intersections at Monza, including 113 metres at 0.71% copper equivalent from 33 metres. Mineralisation remains open in multiple directions, while a largely untested corridor could connect Monza with the nearby Estoril resource.
- 113m at 0.71% CuEq from 33m in MZACD010
- 193m at 0.45% CuEq from 49m in MZACD008
- Mineralisation remains open along strike and at depth
- Aircore anomalism highlights a 1km gap towards Estoril
- Further extensional drilling planned, with MZACD006 assays pending
Monza drilling extends shallow copper-gold mineralisation
LinQ Minerals Limited (ASX:LNQ) has strengthened the case for a sizeable porphyry copper-gold system at Monza, reporting a 113-metre intersection grading 0.71% copper equivalent from just 33 metres in hole MZACD010. The interval included 72 metres at 0.95% CuEq from 45 metres and a higher-grade four-metre section at 5.3% CuEq from 62 metres.
Another new hole, MZACD008, returned 193 metres at 0.45% CuEq from 49 metres. MZACD007 delivered 104 metres at 0.38% CuEq from 159 metres, while MZACD009 produced a shallower 79-metre interval at 0.31% CuEq from 40 metres and a deeper 31 metres at 0.69% CuEq from 352 metres.
Results build on earlier high-grade intersections
The latest assays add to previously reported broad zones including 226 metres at 0.70% CuEq in MZACD003 and 208 metres at 0.61% CuEq in MZACD005. Those holes also contained higher-grade sulphide breccia intervals, including 28 metres at 1.85% CuEq in MZACD003 and five metres at 5.36% CuEq in MZACD005.
LinQ said the new drilling confirms a porphyry copper-gold system associated with monzonite and monzodiorite intrusives. The company interprets the latest results as evidence that mineralisation remains open to the north and east near surface, as well as along strike and at depth in other directions. The reported widths are downhole intervals, however, and true widths have not yet been established.
Untested corridor points towards Estoril
Monza sits about one kilometre northwest of Estoril, within a broader 17-kilometre mineralised porphyry corridor at LinQ’s Gilmore project in New South Wales. Aircore drilling across the gap has already identified multiple anomalous copper-gold responses, but those targets have not yet received deeper testing. LinQ plans to investigate whether the two prospects form part of a single continuous mineralised body.
The company’s wider Gilmore tenement package covers about 597 square kilometres and hosts a stated global mineral resource estimate of 516 million tonnes containing approximately 3.7 million ounces of gold and 1.2 million tonnes of copper. The Monza results are exploration results rather than an updated resource, and the assay results from hole MZACD006 remain outstanding.
Follow-up drilling is the next test
LinQ Executive Chair Clive Donner said the company was planning additional drilling to test the size of the Monza system and its possible extensions towards Estoril. The copper-equivalent figures use assumed prices of US$10,000 a tonne for copper and US$2,500 an ounce for gold; the company says the metals included have reasonable potential to be recovered and sold, while preliminary recoveries are not included in the calculation.
Bottom Line?
Monza has delivered scale and continuity across a limited maiden campaign, but the investment case now depends on whether step-out drilling converts open mineralisation and the Estoril gap into a coherent resource opportunity.
Questions in the middle?
- Will follow-up drilling demonstrate continuity between Monza and Estoril across the untested one-kilometre corridor?
- How much of the reported downhole thickness represents true mineralised width?
- Can future drilling establish a resource at Monza without losing the higher-grade sulphide breccia zones?],
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