Hamelin Gold (ASX:HMG) has kicked off over 3,000m of Phase 2 RC drilling at its Day Dawn Gold Project in Western Australia’s Paterson Province, following a strong opening campaign that confirmed high-grade gold from surface at the Aurora Lode.
Day Dawn sits just 10km northwest of the +20Moz Telfer gold-copper mine, and the next phase is designed to test whether Aurora forms part of something considerably larger.
Aurora goes deeper
Phase 1 delivered a string of high-grade hits, including:
- 3m @ 93.4g/t Au from 9m
- 5m @ 9.1g/t Au from 18m
- 4m @ 21.0g/t Au from 27m
- 3m @ 18.3g/t Au from 35m
- 2m @ 12.4g/t Au from 149m
The key takeaway was continuity.
Aurora was confirmed as a northeast-trending, subvertical gold lode extending from surface and remaining open along strike and at depth.
Now Hamelin Gold is drilling down-plunge, while also testing for parallel lodes that could repeat the Aurora structure elsewhere within the broader corridor.
Figure 1: Day Dawn Project – prospect locations on Bing satellite imagery.
More than one lode?
That may be where the story gets interesting.
Phase 1 also hit high-grade gold at the nearby Altus Lode, around 50m southwest of Aurora, adding weight to the idea that Day Dawn could host multiple structurally controlled gold zones rather than a single isolated shoot.
The current campaign will test those potential repetitions while improving the company’s structural model ahead of deeper drilling.
Managing Director Peter Bewick said Phase 1 had strengthened confidence in the broader scale potential of Day Dawn.
Then comes the Telfer-style test
RC drilling is only the first part of the next exploration push.
An EIS co-funded diamond program is scheduled to begin in the second half of September, targeting the interpreted intersection between the mineralised feeder system and prospective Telfer Formation stratigraphy at depth.
That is the bigger geological question.
If the shallow high-grade lodes are simply the upper expression of a larger intrusive-related system, the deeper drilling could materially change the Day Dawn story.
What’s next
The Phase 2 RC program is expected to take around three to four weeks, with first assays due across September and October.
Then the diamond rig arrives.
For Hamelin Gold, the next few months are about moving from high-grade shallow hits to answering the bigger question:
How far does Day Dawn really go?
