The Cloncurry and Mt Isa regions are storied copper jurisdictions, but could there be another Queensland district worth keeping an eye on?
True North Copper has been delineating its Mt Oxide project near the Capricorn mine in Gunpowder, Queensland, which had mined copper since the 1970s before extreme weather brought it to a standstill in March 2023 and again in March 2024.
With a mine life of at least 10 years, Capricorn isn’t short on resources, with 29Metals advancing the mine towards a restart.
True North believes its Mt Oxide project bears similarities to the Capricorn mine, and recent rock chip sampling has demonstrated the potential for new zones of surface copper mineralisation.
The sampling program was conducted at the Aquila and Ivena North prospects, with the copper mineralisation hosted within the dorman fault mineral system, a 10km-long trend that hosts the Vero copper-silver-cobalt resource and the Camp Gossans prospect.
Six zones of anomalous copper, cobalt, and arsenic, associated with multiple gossanous breccia structures, were discovered at Aquila.
Highlights include the Aquila B trend, a 180m-long and 30m-wide zone of copper mineralisation, with rock chip channels returning 3.6m at 0.49 per cent copper and a peak assay of 0.94 per cent copper.
Additionally, the Aquila A trend, which is 20m-long and up to 12m-wide, returned up to 0.05 per cent copper and 12.7 grams per tonne silver.
At the Ivena North prospect, sampling identified copper, cobalt, and arsenic trends within two zones from gossanous breccia structures up to 25m wide.
The Ivena North A trend, extending 130m long and up to 15m wide, returned assays of up to 1.38 per cent copper.
“Our exploration team has been working hard to systematically map and sample the +10km Dorman fault trend at Mt Oxide,” True North Copper managing director Bevan Jones said.
“Multiple gossans have been identified, and rock chip results from the gossans are revealing large areas of wider and stronger mineralisation on which to focus our future exploration work, including the ongoing MIMDAS geophysical survey.”
Jones said the company is remobilising the on-ground team to systematically collect additional rock chip samples over the newly discovered Black Marlin and Rhea structures.
“Further geophysical results are filtering through, and updates will be released soon. We are potentially building a significant district at Mt Oxide with multiple high priority targets which have never been drilled,” he said.
“Our next steps include prioritisation of these targets, designing and planning upcoming drill programs, and securing the necessary permits for on-ground access.”
Rock chip results will be integrated with ongoing mapping and the results from a Queensland Government-funded MIMDAS IP and MT survey, which is currently underway along the Dorman Fault mineral system.
With the presence of Capricorn and the work of True North at its Mt Oxide project, could we be seeing the emergence of a new copper Queensland district?
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