Accelerate Resources (ASX:AX8) confirms structural controls on high grade manganese
Accelerate Resources has completed a high resolution ground gravity survey over the core Gingarrigan and El Largo corridors within its Woodie Woodie North Manganese Project in the East Pilbara, Western Australia.
The gravity survey covers approximately 4.5 x 2 km, while mapped manganese outcrops extend beyond the survey footprint.
Highlights
The ground gravity survey indicates a network of structures that coincide with numerous mapped manganese outcrops across the Gingarrigan and El Largo corridors.
Several of the larger high grade manganese outcrop clusters occur at or near interpreted structural intersections.
High resolution LiDAR and approximately 2.5 cm orthophotography have been acquired across the core survey area for integration with geological mapping, sampling and gravity interpretation to refine RC drill targets.
Woodie Woodie North has an Inferred Mineral Resource Estimate of 1.2 Mt at 19.1% Mn at a 15% Mn cut off and Exploration Targets of 5.3 to 10.7 Mt at 10 to 19% Mn, which do not include the Gingarrigan or El Largo trends.
Atlas Geophysics collected 2,440 gravity stations across the survey area, with the dataset subsequently processed and interpreted by Southern Geoscience Consultants.
The first vertical derivative product was used to enhance short wavelength gravity gradients and assist interpretation of near surface structural architecture.
When the interpreted gravity structures are overlaid with Accelerate’s mapped manganese outcrops, the company reports a clear spatial relationship.
Numerous manganese occurrences lie on or immediately adjacent to interpreted structures, while larger outcrop clusters around Rancor and the Gingarrigan and Gingerbread area occur in zones of greater structural complexity or at interpreted structure intersections.
Accelerate interprets the relationship as supporting a fault hosted and fault fill hydrothermal manganese model, in which structures acted as pathways for mineralising fluids and structurally favourable sites provided space for manganese deposition.
Published geological studies of the Woodie Woodie manganese district demonstrate a strong spatial association between manganese mineralisation and faulting, with high grade ore bodies reported to occur on steep secondary and tertiary structures extending from larger basin controlling faults.
Pegasus Airborne Systems has also completed a high resolution airborne survey across the approximately 7 km² core Gingarrigan and El Largo survey area.
The program delivered high resolution LiDAR topographic data and 2.5 cm resolution orthophotography, providing a detailed surface model for geological mapping, outcrop interpretation, access planning and drill targeting.
Accelerate Resources CEO Luke Meter said:
“With gravity, LiDAR and detailed mapping now integrated, we have a much stronger geological framework for targeting the upcoming drill program.”
The Woodie Woodie North Manganese Project is located approximately 260 km east of Port Hedland and 55 km north of Consolidated Minerals’ operating Woodie Woodie Manganese Mine.
The project covers 432 km² of Proterozoic sediments and incorporates 7 mapped large scale manganese corridors extending over 42 km of strike.
Exploration drilling to date and Accelerate’s RC drilling campaigns completed in 2022 and 2023 across Barra North, Barra South and Area 42 defined the existing Inferred Mineral Resource Estimate and Exploration Targets.
The announcement states that the potential quantity and grade of the Exploration Target is conceptual in nature, there has been insufficient exploration to estimate a Mineral Resource, and it is uncertain if further exploration will result in the estimation of a Mineral Resource.
Accelerate will now finalise the integrated structural interpretation using the gravity, LiDAR, orthophotography and field mapping datasets.
The work will be used to rank priority structural intersections and manganese bearing corridors for drill testing and complete the final RC drill design for the Gingarrigan and Gingerbread area following receipt of heritage clearance and the required approvals.
Interpretation and mapping will also continue along the broader El Largo trend in preparation for the maiden drilling program, which is expected to commence in September 2026, subject to receipt of heritage clearance and the required approvals.