Group Report GR 351 McArthur River area Bridging Report to 20th November 2016

Abstract

Ripple Resources is a fully owned subsidiary of Armour Energy Ltd. Armour has been exploring the gas and oil resources of the McArthur Basin, and has made a significant gas discovery in the Glyde sub basin. Ripple has selected Exploration Licences within areas inside the Armour Energy permits, and has been cooperating with Armour in order to evaluate these ELs for their base metal potential. This cooperation has involved modifications and extensions to the Armour program so that it has greater relevance for base metal exploration. Additionally, the techniques and concepts used in hydrocarbon exploration overlap with leading edge base metal exploration. Base metal exploration within these Licences is challenging because of the cover geology. Breccia hosted and stratiform mineralisation trends into the area from outcropping areas, the most notable being the Bald Hills - HYC trend and Western Emu fault. Previous exploration by did not locate any geochemical anomalism within the EL area. Ripple has made an in-depth study of the distribution of Barney creek formation in the EL environs and believes that there is a likelihood of a repetition of HYC style mineralisation along the margins of the Batten trough north of Merlin mine, on the north side of the Mallapunyah fault system, within the Watershed basin on the east side of the Tawallah fault, and in the western Bone Creek area. Other potential host formations such as the McDermott, Wollogorang, and Lynott offer a secondary potential in structurally favourable locations elsewhere. Ripple has co funded a CSIRO study of these formations. The 2016 program was deferred for a year because of the untimely death of Aubrey McLarendon, the ultimate source of Ripple funding. His estate has withdrawn from the program and other funding measures are now in place. Severe Penalty Reductions are expected to be applied to the project area, and a review has suggested that the main targets will be able to be preserved. A proposed program for the next 24 months should be comprised of airborne gravity and leakage geochemistry trials. Drilling is planned for specific targets in some ELs. Ripple Resources will share in any Armour Energy work (mainly drilling and geophysics) which may be of relevance to mineral exploration.