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Introduction

The Lady Annie oxide copper deposit is located 137km northwest of Mount Isa (Figure 1), within the sublease of ML5568 (Figure 2).  This is currently the subject of a Mining Lease application with grant expected early in 2008.  In addition to the interest in the ML5568 sublease, CopperCo has acquired exploration permits in the region of the Lady Annie Project. (Figure 2). 

The Lady Annie oxide copper deposit consists primarily of near surface malachite mineralisation underlain by deeper transitional and sulphide chalcocite mineralisation at depths ranging from 60 m to 100 m.  In plan, Lady Annie forms a 700 m by 600 m U-shape around a low hill (Figure 3).

Lady Annie Oxide Copper Resource

 

The principal structural controls at Lady Annie are the steeply dipping southwest Mount Lorrie fault, the shallow south dipping Hoey’s and Mine faults and the north-northwest trending Paradise Creek and Fosters faults.

 

The Mineral Resource estimate encompasses the oxide zone, defined as all mineralisation above the Base of Complete Oxidation (“BOCO”) and the sulphide zone, defined as all mineralisation below BOCO.  The Mineral Resource estimate utilised the Ordinary Kriging method of grade estimation. 

 

Lady Annie Transitional Copper Resource

 

The Lady Annie transition and primary sulphide mineral resource occurs beneath previously defined oxide copper mineralisation.  The majority of recent drilling targeting transition zone mineralisation has concentrated on the western side of the deposit, although the eastern side is considered to have equivalent potential.  Drilling on the western side has been conducted on 25m spaced east-west sections.

 

The transition zone mineralisation is characterised by malachite with chalcocite and minor cuprite and chrysocolla.  The primary sulphide mineralisation consists of one or more of chalcocite, chalcopyrite, bornite and pyrite occurring in carbonate and quartz veins and vein breccias.  The sulphide mineralisation at depth appears to be structurally controlled with significant drill intersections commonly associated with fault zone related silicification (Figure 4).

 

Initial metallurgical test work on this chalcocite core material indicated a favourable flotation response with a rougher concentrate grade of 30% copper at 90% recovery.  The Company expects that with extra flotation stages the overall recovery can be increased further whilst achieving higher concentrate grades.

 

Other test work on ore leaching, concentrate acid leach response, reagent consumption and froth flotation performance has also been conducted.  The ore leaching characteristics appear straightforward although the high acid consuming nature of associated gangue constituents render it doubtful this material could be economically heap leached. Mild leach conditions indicated very high dissolution of copper from the rougher concentrate at acceptable acid consumption levels.  The flowsheet options evaluated to date will be confirmed during 2008 and alternative gangue rejection possibilities to further test heap leach amenability.

 

Lady Brenda

 

Lady Brenda is located approximately 300 metres to the southwest of Lady Annie and comprises 2 distinct zones of mineralisation. A reverse circulation (“RC”) drilling program was completed in early November 2007 and an inaugural Mineral Resource estimate was released.

 

Mineralisation remains open to the northeast and southwest and further RC and diamond drilling will be undertaken in order to increase the confidence levels of the Mineral Resource and to close off the strike extents.  Previous drilling results include 9m @ 1.61% Cu in the oxide and 26m @ 1.74% Cu in the sulphide zone (Figure 5).

 

Other Targets in the Lady Annie Area

CopperCo holds an extensive exploration package, surrounding the Lady Annie Mine.  A further 15 exploration targets have been identified based on a review of previous and new exploration data, including soil geochemical and geophysical surveys and the presence of outcropping oxide copper mineralisation.