AusQuest Limited advised that drilling at the Balladonia Copper-Nickel Project in the Fraser Range region of Western Australia (WA) has further enhanced the base metal prospectivity of the project, which is subject to the Strategic Alliance Agreement (SAA) with a wholly-owned subsidiary of South32 Limited (South32). At the Tea Tree Prospect, a total of four diamond holes for ~940m were completed across a NNW trending magnetic/gravity corridor. The holes intersected a sequence of metapelites containing banded iron formations (BIFs), garnetiferous quartzites, garnetites and mafic volcanics with zones of red-rock (potassic) alteration within the sequence. These characteristics are similar to the so-called `lode packages' found in the world-class Cloncurry Belt in NW Queensland which hosts Broken Hill Type (BHT) Pb-Zn-Ag and iron-oxide copper-gold (IOCG) deposits. These potential `lode packages' have not previously been recorded in the Fraser Province and, if confirmed by geochemical results and petrography, will significantly upgrade the prospectivity of the region - with high amplitude magnetic/gravity anomalies within the Balladonia Project becoming high-priority targets for BHT Pb-Zn-Ag and/or IOCG mineralisation. Drill-hole BDDDH013, which targeted an EM conductor near the western margin of the interpreted `lode package', intersected thin beds (3.3m and 1.3m wide) of graphite which are being tested for graphitic carbon content and grain size. Visual estimates suggest that the graphite is relatively clean with coarse flakes of up to 6mm in size. The extent and size of the graphitic unit is unknown at this stage as there has been
no prior regional exploration for graphite in this area. At the Harms Lake Prospect only one of the targets was tested by drilling before the
program had to be suspended due to access issues caused by heavy rain in the area. Drill-hole BDDD017, which was sited to test an EM conductor east of the interpreted intrusive, intersected narrow graphitic zones (3.4m and 0.6m wide) within a wide zone (20m) of potassic alteration. Geological logging and sampling of this hole is still to be completed once access to the prospect is restored.