Soldiers Creek Project First Annual Report EL 31209 5 December 2016 to 4 December 2017

Abstract

The Soldiers Creek project is located in the Daly River region approximately 200 km south of Darwin in the Northern Territory. The project comprises a single exploration licence (EL 31209; Figure 1) which lies in the western part of the Pine Creek Orogen. The project area contains the historical Muldiva/Buldiva and Collia prospects from which 103t of tin was mined from 1923 through to 1980 (Frater, 2005). A mapping and sampling programme was completed across these prospect areas in September/October 2017. Rock chip and soil samples were sent for laboratory analysis and over 1000 soil pXRF readings were taken across both areas. The results of the work at Muldiva - Buldiva shows that the pegmatites are geochemically classified as fertile and prospective for lithium mineralisation. The pegmatites contain tin mineralisation with 15 samples having greater than 1% cassiterite content. The alluvial sediments draining from the pegmatites at Buldiva are of high grade with an average of 2.75 kg SnO2/m3. The work at Collia has identified fertile LCT pegmatites as classified using the pegmatite fractionation Cerney (1993) classification scheme. The mapped pegmatites are generally thin (average 0.4m) and shallow dipping. The location of the samples are within a granite pluton, and therefore the potential for economic mineralisation of lithium is limited, though more prospective pegmatites may lie further afield and outside of the current area of exploration. Further work is required to identify additional target areas.