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JUNIOR exploration company Blackham Resources has secured more than $9 million to fund ongoing exploration at its Matilda gold project in northern WA. New York-based The Lind Partners manages the Australian Special Opportunity Fund, and facilitated an $8.125 million funding agreement between the Australian Special Opportunity Fund and Blackham. Once the agreement has been executed, Lind will give Blackham an initial $250,000 in the form of a $175,000 convertible security and a $75,000 pre-payment for ordinary shares in Blackham. For the next three years, Lind will purchase between $75,000 and $250,000 worth of Blackham shares on a monthly basis. In addition to the $8.125 million funding agreement, Blackham will issue 4.8 million ordinary shares at $0.21 each to sophisticated investors…

EMERGING iron ore company Brockman Resources has intersected direct shipping ore (DSO) mineralisation at its Sirius iron prospect, within the Ophthalmia project area north of Newman in WA’s Pilbara region, confirming the potential of the project. Results were returned for seven of eight reconnaissance diamond drill holes, all of which intersected iron mineralisation. Highlight intersections included 99.15m grading 62 per cent iron, and 70.05m grading 60.6 per cent iron. The previously reported eighth hole intersected 135.45m grading 61.02 per cent iron. Brockman chief executive offi cer Russell Tipper said the results from Sirius supported the company’s confidence that the wholly-owned Ophthalmia could be developed into a potentially viable mine that could operate in conjunction with its flagship Marillana project, about…

A WEEK after discovering course flake graphite at the Argent and Stanley prospects within its Waddikee project, Monax Mining has identified course graphite at a second site within the same deposit. The 2mm flakes, collected near a historical rock chip site, were discovered as part of reconnaissance sampling from the Balumbah prospect; the discovery has confirmed the potential for the Waddikee project, which lies on the Eyre Peninsula. A graphite exploration program undertaken by Monax focussed on assessing historical reports from its wholly-owned Waddikee project, and in a recent statement the company said it was encouraged by the presence of very course graphite within the project area. “Confirmation of a second site of course graphite on the Waddikee project at…

GOLD mineralisation has been discovered at Global Metals Exploration’s flagship Jutson Rocks project, 125km northeast of Laverton in WA’s Eastern Goldfields. Intersections of up to 3.5 grams of gold per tonne across 4m were found during a maiden rotary air blast (RAB) drilling program that consisted of 86 drill holes for a total of 2181m. Nickel, zinc and copper base metals were also intersected, returning results including 36m grading 0.2 per cent nickel from 16m for one drill hole. However, the company said it was unclear whether those results were significant bedrock mineralisation indicators or represented a form of minor supergene enrichment. The auger gold anomalies drilled were defined from a previous bulk leach extractable gold sampling program. Most of…

SOUTH Australian-based Minotaur Exploration has sold its wholly-owned Roxby Downs tenements to BHP Billiton for $10 million. The sale and purchase deed between Minotaur and BHP involves five of Minotaur’s exploration tenements that cover 2555 square kilometres in the Gawler Craton, near BHP’s Olympic Dam operation in South Australia. As part of the agreement, another BHP subsidiary relinquished its 41 per cent interest in the Mutooroo/Thackaringa joint venture at Bonython Hill, allowing Minotaur to regain 100 per cent ownership of the base metal project. In a statement, Minotaur said the deep exploration of geophysical targets around Roxby Downs was inconsistent to its risk portfolio, and reported that it would turn its focus to exploration on its Cloncurry iron oxide copper…

THE resource industry’s peak national employer group the Australian Mines and Metals Association (AMMA), has labelled a recent Fair Work Australia (FWA) tribunal drug test ruling “inconsistent and conflicting”, warning that the decision could restrict employers from adequately managing drug and alcohol issues. The tribunal ruled that companies could only administer on-site drug and alcohol testing using oral swabs, despite urine tests proving more effective, and found that the use of urine testing was “unjust and unreasonable”. Last month, electricity infrastructure company Endeavour Energy confirmed it had lodged an appeal against FWA’s ruling, saying “it was urine testing, not saliva-based drug testing, that best mitigated the foreseeable risks associated with chronic drug use”. The AMMA has backed the appeal, saying…

ASX-listed Mincor has boosted nickel production and its operating surplus while driving down cash costs for the March 2012 quarter. Compared to the December 2011 quarter, nickel production was up 30 per cent to 87,696t grading 3.06 per cent nickel for 2683.4t of nickel in ore. Cash costs dropped from $7 per pound of nickel in the December period to $4.96/lb for the three months ending March. Despite lower nickel prices, Mincor’s operating surplus leapt 108 per cent to $14.58 million from $7 million in the December 2011 quarter. The rise in surplus was attributed to higher-grade nickel and increased production levels combined with a reduction in cash costs. Mincor used the surplus to fund its share buyback program, which…

DIVERSIFIED metals explorer Midas Resources has entered into a joint venture with Perth-based private exploration company Cazador Resources in a move that will expand Midas’s prospective Leonora gold project from 219 to 375 square kilometres. Midas will earn a 75 per cent interest in exploration tenements E40/284 and E40/288, which adjoin its Leonora gold project tenements in WA, and cover significant sections of key faults believed to be important structural controls in the distribution of gold in the Leonora South area. These structures, known as Dingo-Kelpie and Dahlia, continue through the Midas tenements into the Cazador tenements. Midas will embark on an auger drilling program in May – involving 500 holes over a 12km strike length – pending completion of…

VIKING Ashanti has increased its gold resource by 40 per cent at its wholly-owned Akoase East gold project in southern Ghana. The Perth-based company, which was established in 2007 to develop and mine mineral deposits in West Africa, last month announced an updated JORC classified inferred resource estimate of 18 million tonnes grading 1.2 grams per tonne of gold for 704,000 ounces of contained gold, at a 0.5g/t gold cut-off. This latest resource estimate is based on 10,000m of historical reverse circulation data, plus data from about 8000m of RC drilling and 3000m of diamond drilling completed by Viking during the past 18 months. Viking managing director Peter McMickan said the new resource  estimate gave the company increased confidence that…

NSL Consolidated has produced the first saleable beneficiated iron ore during the commissioning of the phase one Kurnool iron ore dry separation plant in India and is on track for its first sales revenue by the end of the June quarter. A beneficiated iron ore grade of 58 per cent was achieved on a dry separation circuit and further process optimisation will continue. NSL said this was a significant milestone for the company, which is aiming at a phase one initial steady production rate of 200,000 beneficiated tonnes per annum from Kurnool. Currently, 58 per cent iron ore sells domestically at the mine gate for about US$90 per tonne. The company said that given the strength in both demand and…

FUNDING is still available to assist employees and enterprises within the minerals and resources industries to improve skills and workplace productivity, SkillsDM has said. The nationally-recognised advisory board said that funds were still available from the $20.5 million allocated by the Commonwealth Government to the coal mining, metalliferous mining, quarrying (extractive), drilling and civil infrastructure sectors through the National Workforce Development Fund (NWDF). The NWDF was launched in 2011 to provide $558 million during four years to support training and workforcedevelopment in areas facing skills shortages. According to SkillsDM, the NWDF can provide between 34 per cent and 67 per cent of the cost of delivering nationally-endorsed qualifications and skills sets. The first instalment of the funds was focussed on…