Alice Queen has commenced exploration at its Viani project in the Pacific Rim of Fire in Vanua Levu, Fiji, as it looks to uncover a potentially large epithermal gold system.
It comes after the company reviewed all historical work and data sets completed by previous operators such as Pacific Island Gold and Geopacific Resources, which was considered an important first step in the evaluation of Viani.
This has enabled Alice Queen to identify areas of interest and build the foundations of future field programs.
A trending gold and associated pathfinder soil anomaly spanning more than 5km was identified at the Dakuniba prospect, while a six-hole drill program returned encouraging gold intercepts across a 700m trend which remains open.
Notable results included 2.2m at 11.3 grams per tonne (g/t) from 121.45m including 0.6m at 27.6g/t.
“We are very pleased to properly introduce Viani to our shareholders as one of our key exploration assets after the many years of effort undertaken by the company to review and secure the project,” Alice Queen managing director Andrew Buxton said.
“We believe that Viani may host a major epithermal system that has been overlooked by previous explorers and we are excited to be commencing exploration on site and look forward to reporting regularly on our activities on the ground.”
Alice Queen has completed a first pass field reconnaissance program to understand land access and check sites of interest around historical drilling at the Dakuniba prospect.
Approximately 20 chip samples were also collected, with assays now returned. Field observation and assay results found multiple outcrops with hydrothermally altered rock and mineralised veining observed.
A number of positive gold assays up to 4.61g/t gold were returned from veining and alteration zones.
The Pacific Rim of Fire where Viani is located hosts several world-class porphyry and epithermal deposits such as Grasberg, Panguna, Porgera, Marta Hill, Vatukoula and Lihir.