Brumby targets NT manganese

  Diversified exploration company Brumby Resources has opened up a significant new exploration front in the Northern Territory, with a recently completed geophysical survey defining seven priority manganese exploration targets at the company’s Bootu Creek Project, located 120km north of Tennant Creek.Brumby said the targets, located using a Skytem Helicopter Electromagnetic survey (HEM), are up to one kilometre in length and lie within the company’s 78sqkm tenement, just 10km north of OM (Manganese) Limited’s 550,000tpa Bootu Creek manganese operation.According to Brumby, the HEM survey was designed to further investigate 18 previously identified anomalies that were considered to be prospective manganese targets at Bootu Creek from a regional and geological evaluation of the Bootu Creek and Renner Springs manganese province.Brumby said it will focus initially on the coincident or associated Landsat and HEM conductors as priority exploration targets, with field checking and sampling of these areas scheduled during December 2007. The company said it expects drill testing of these areas will commence during the first half of 2008, once appropriate clearances have been obtained.Commenting on the results of the survey, Brumby’s Managing Director Geoff Jones, said: “The HEM survey data has added significant value to our Bootu Creek exploration project, defining seven priority target areas for manganese exploration, which we plan to advance as quickly as possible to the drilling stage early next year.”“The scale of the targets is particularly impressive and highlights the strategic potential of this project area, which is located in close proximity to the recently commissioned Bootu Creek manganese mine and existing infrastructure,” he said.“This opens up an exciting new front to our planned exploration activities for 2008, complementing our Pardoo East Iron Ore Project in the Pilbara region where we are planning to commence drilling to test two large gravity targets which are prospective for iron mineralisation.”