Summary
- Historic sampling had an average grade of 62% Fe, Alien’s own due diligence sampling returned grades as high as 65.4%
- The tenement contains parts of historic BHP deposits and is bordered by projects owned by FMG and Rio Tinto.
- The project is still heavily underexplored and thus has potential to considerably increase the size of Alien’s Iron Ore resources.
Exploration Targets
BHP, as part of their much larger regional programme, explored this tenement in the 1960s and identified two ‘deposits’ from a combination of mapping and surface rock chip sampling. Prospects BHP19 and 20 are associated with the Brockman tenement. From initial rock chip samples, the grades are as follows:
- BHP 19 – Average 62.8% Fe
- BHP 20 – Average 62.0% Fe
BHP used generalised outcrop dimensions and average grade of rock-chip sampling to calculate the estimated Fe tonnage per vertical feet, returning equivalent of 300,000 tons per vertical meter over a surface area of 0.12 square kilometres on the BHP20 prospect.
The tenement is dominated by the Brockman Iron Formation with tertiary alluvial cover is prevalent and covers much of the surface. Northern areas of the tenement remain highly underexplored yet already contain significant potential for hosting economic high grade iron ore deposits.
Alien have postulated an initial model of the dip and strike of the BHP20 target with provisional drill hole locations to test this model. Drilling has recently been carried out by Rio Tinto immediately south of the tenement boundary on the detrital material shed from this mineralised zone
Previous Exploration
A brief site visit in November 2019 as part of a due diligence exercise enabled a few samples to be collected at both BHP19 and BHP20 prospects with independent laboratory results confirming the Company’s views on the exploration potential of the Hancock tenement.
Alien has compiled all historic data into a core database extracting all relevant information from a series of old reports and maps and combine this with any new regional remote sensing data available.
Alien completed an exploration field program in November 2020, sampling over the known prospects within the tenement fully outlining the surface extent of the mineralised units as well as to add mapping and structural information to look for potential repeat structures and orebodies undiscovered to date.
Regional traverses around known prospects have also been done to test, as mentioned above, the unchartered areas of the tenements and to better understand any repeat structures associated with structural controls in the region.
Maiden Drilling Program
Alien feel that the BHP19 and BHP20 prospects are drill ready targets hence from the model devised, finalisation of maiden drilling has been planned for the tenement once access permission is available.
Upon receiving Heritage clearance the company have taken time during the submittal of applications to build links with the indigenous communities and build on the vital social license to operate. A follow up sampling and mapping programme is planned prior to finalising drilling plans.
Alien have completed multiple phases of drilling at the accompanying Hancock tenement, the other member of the Hamersley Iron Ore Project, with exceptional results. It is hoped that the Brockman project will similarly exceed expectations when drilled.