Sydney, Feb 5, 2009 AEST (ABN Newswire) - Robust Resources Limited (ASX:ROL) is pleased to report that assays from the first two diamond drill holes in its Romang Island, Indonesia, exploration program have confirmed the presence of large scale gold and silver mineralisation as first indicated in drilling by Billiton between 1997 and 1999.
Robust's first hole, LWD-015, intersected 41-metres of potentially economic gold and silver mineralisation, from 1 metre i.e.:
LWD-015: 41 metres at 1.34 g/t Gold and 102 g/t Silver from 1m, including
17 metres at 1.58 g/t Gold and 203 g/t Silver (from 3m)
Using current gold and silver prices(Note 1) the above intersections translate to:
41 metres at 2.72 g/t Gold Equivalent(Note 2)
17 metres at 4.33 g/t Gold Equivalent
Note:
(1) www.kitco.com on 02.02.09
(2) Gold Equivalent = (gold assay + silver assay) x (silver price / gold price).
Hole LWD-016 contains elevated levels of gold and silver and strong lead, zinc and barium over 101.25 metres, its entire length.
Barium mineralisation occurs throughout both holes and has a strong association with precious metals in this environment.
The two holes, LWD-015 and LWD-016, both drilled thick zones of strongly hydrothermally altered and mineralised rocks from the collars to the ends of the holes. More detail and summaries of the drilling are appended.
The directors believe that these first assay results confirm that Romang Island is highly prospective for precious metals, particularly gold and silver and have requested priority treatment for assays of samples from the next six holes, which have been sent to Jakarta. Results are expected in three to four weeks.
Robust's Romang Island Project comprises five mineral titles with two more under application, covering the entire volcanic caldera, which forms the 25,000 hectare island in Indonesia's Banda magmatic arc. The caldera is a mineralising system comparable in size to that of the Lihir gold mine in Papua News Guinea.
Robust has now completed 500 metres of drilling in the Lakuwahi Prospect and remains on track to complete 2,500 metres of drilling by June of this year.
Ashton Mining and Billiton carried out previous exploration reconnaissance on the project during the 1990s. Billiton drilled a total of 14 holes in two scout drilling programs at Lukawahi in the south of the island between 1997 and 1999, intersecting economically significant gold, silver, zinc, lead and copper mineralisation in 80% of the holes drilled. The best of these previous results included:
LWD -02: 1 g/t Au over entire length of 73.9 metres including 34m@ 2.10 g/t
LWD-06: intersected 4 metres at 2.48 g/t Au and 3 metres at 2.39 g/t Au at shallow depths and also base metal intersections of 4m @ 3%Pb and 3m at 4.8% Zn.
LWD-07: averaged just under 1 g/t Au over entire length of 67.4 metres
LWD-08: intersected a 30 metre zone averaging 1.43 g/t Au
Robust Resources will continue to update shareholders on drilling progress and assay results as its exploration program continues.
The company's two NQ Core diamond drilling rigs are performing particularly well and consideration is being given to the purchase of a third rig to accelerate the program.
Contact
Gary Lewis
Executive Director
TEL: +61-422-880-055
Ian Finch
Chairman
TEL: +61-8-9485-1040
| ||
|
