Tanzania
Songea Nickel Project
The Songea Project is located in southwest Tanzania and was part of the Albidon-BHP Billiton Exploration Cooperation Agreement from which BHP Billiton withdrew in February of 2009. BHP Billiton did not complete the earn-in expenditure requirement and hence the project has since reverted back to Albidon. The Songea project consists of five Prospecting Licences, covering 488.2 sq km.
A systematic stream sediment geochemical survey undertaken by an Albidon-BHP Billiton team led to the identification of significant nickel and copper anomalies in three areas within the Songea Project Area (Kitai South, Mbinga Prospect, Liparamba Prospect), with peak values of up to 582 ppm Ni and up to 176 ppm Cu. A VTEM airborne electromagnetic survey covering the Songea Project in southwest Tanzania was completed by BHP Billiton in late 2007. The survey totalled 3,016 line kilometres covering 414 sq km over several prospective mafic-ultramafic intrusion complexes. The survey was undertaken to follow up the significant Ni and Cu anomalies identified in the previous stream sediment geochemical sampling.
The VTEM survey has delineated a number of conductor anomalies at both the Liparamba and Mbinga Prospect areas. Of these, the high priority late-time EM conductor targets at the Liparamba and Mbinga Prospects are located mostly within or near the contacts of the prospective intrusion rocks covered by the EM survey. Several of the EM conductors are coincident with nickel and copper geochemical anomalies defined by soil and/or drainage geochemical sampling. At Liparamba one of the conductors is coincident with a geochemical anomaly defined by assay values of up to 3,500ppm Ni (0.35% Ni) in soil samples. At Mbinga, one group of conductor targets is closely associated with a Ni-Cu soil geochemical anomaly located within an embayment at the eastern contact of the Mbinga Intrusion.
Several of the Ni-Cu anomalies are accompanied by Co, Pt and Pd anomalies, supporting the interpretation that the Ni-Cu anomalies reflect nickel sulphide mineralisation. The soil geochemical sampling areas, which have been limited to date, will now be extended on the basis of the latest results. The geology of both the Liparamba and Mbinga prospect areas is highly prospective. The Liparamba target is a noritic intrusion, with a diameter of several kilometres. Mineralogical studies have confirmed the presence of the nickel sulphide mineral pentlandite within gabbro-norite and olivine gabbro rocks close to the south-western contact of the intrusion. The Mbinga prospect area is interpreted to represent a multi-chamber norite-troctolite intrusion measuring 9km x 6km in size. Nickel sulphide has also been confirmed in outcrop samples near the eastern embayment area at Mbinga. The geology of the norite and troctolite rocks at Mbinga-Liparamba is similar to that at Vale Inco's large nickel sulphide ore body at Voisey's Bay in eastern Canada. Detailed soil geochemical sampling will be undertaken over all the priority EM conductor targets and to extend the small areas covered to date. This work will be accompanied by detailed analysis and interpretation of the EM data, and these two datasets will then be combined with the aim of defining drill targets.
A detailed geochemical soil sampling and geological mapping program was conducted mid this year in the Mbinga West and Liparamba tenements. This was aimed at further delineating anomalous nickel zones for drilling. A total of 1040 soil samples have since been collected and dispatched to the assay lab. Assay results are awaited. A first pass drill program will ensue once assay results are received. The drill program will be completed within the fourth quarter of this year.
