Gateway Mining has kicked off a massive regional soil sampling program at its Glenburgh South project in Western Australia’s Gascoyne region where it is hunting for a lookalike to its neighbour Benz Mining’s celebrated tier- 1 Glenburgh gold discovery.

The company says it now has boots on the ground to collect more than 2400 soil samples across two highly prospective structural trends that share striking similarities with the geological setting of Benz’s nearby deposit.

That discovery holds an exploration target of 10 to 12 million ounces at 0.6 to 0.7 grams per tonne (g/t) gold and has catapulted Benz’s market capitalisation to more than $1 billion over the last year.

Gateway’s program represents the first systematic geochemical shakedown of the ground and will test about 50 kilometres of prospective strike along the Errabiddy and Northern Shear Corridors.

‘We believe our Glenburgh South project has the potential to emerge as a significant new gold camp.’Gateway Mining chief executive officer Richard Pugh

The new campaign comes hot on the heels of a recently completed high-resolution magnetic survey that lit up the two corridors, identifying polyphase folding, major shear zones and favourable structural repetitions of the same geology that hosts the adjacent Glenburgh deposit.

Gateway says both of its target corridors occur within the same prospective host stratigraphy and along parallel structures to the mineralised system at Glenburgh. Field activities which had been delayed by a significant wet season are now in full swing after improved ground conditions allowed access.

The larger of the two targets is the Errabiddy corridor, a regional structural trend that stretches for about 50km. The company’s initial program will test a 25km-long section of the trend which remains largely untested by any systematic geochem despite its favourable geological setting.

The second target, the Northern Shear corridor, is another significant exploration opportunity defined by the recent magnetic survey. The structure runs for approximately 25km and is interpreted by the company to be a potential repetition of the mineralising architecture found at the Glenburgh deposit.

Gateway Mining chief executive officer Richard Pugh said: “The ongoing phenomenal success of Benz highlights what is possible if Gateway delineates repeats of the mineralisation, with Glenburgh having recently delivered Benz a market capitalisation in excess of $1 billion in a relatively short period of time. Both of our target corridors occur within the same prospective host stratigraphy and along parallel structural trends to the Glenburgh mineralised system. Together, Gateway controls approximately 50 kilometres strike of largely untested exploration opportunity.”

While the early-stage work at Glenburgh South represents a major new greenfields front for the company, Gateway has also put its foot on the accelerator at its flagship Yandal gold project in the prolific Yandal greenstone belt having completed 52,000 metres of drilling during the June quarter.

The company recently commissioned a second reverse circulation drill rig to come to grips with its burgeoning Cowza gold discovery. The move marks a significant step-up in exploration after recent wide-spaced air-core drilling confirmed a continuous high-grade gold corridor at Cowza stretching over an impressive 3.5 kilometres of strike.

Standout intercepts from the shallow drilling that defined the corridor include an impressive four metres grading 11.1g/t gold from 72m, 8 metres at 3.1g/t gold from 76m and 4 metres at 3.3g/t gold from 80m.

Gateway has moved quickly to develop the recent discovery, with the strike length expanding almost as fast as the company can drill it. Just a week after tripling the strike to 2.5km, the company extended it by another kilometre to its current 3.5kms.

With a well-stocked war chest of $15.1 million in cash and liquid securities as of the end of the June quarter, Gateway is fully funded to see its programs through and chase up any encouraging results with the drill bit.

The soil sampling program is expected to take about four weeks to complete, with assay results anticipated later in the quarter. The data will then be integrated with recently completed magnetic and hyperspectral datasets to refine the geological models and prioritise targets for follow-up mapping and drilling.

For a junior explorer, there’s nothing quite like having a multi-million-ounce discovery next door to get the blood pumping. When recent geophysics suggest you might be sitting on a mirror image of the same geology, things can get interesting pretty quickly.

With boots on the ground at Glenburgh South and a pipeline of advanced targets firming up at Gidgee, Gateway is attacking on two fronts. The company is now waiting anxiously to see if the first-pass geochem work at Glenburgh South will point it towards the next major gold camp in the broader Glenburgh district.

Is your ASX-listed company doing something interesting? Contact: mattbirney@bullsnbears.com.au