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NILE VALLEY BLOCK
E – Gold (Gippsland 50%)
Location
Nile Valley Block E prospect is situated 5.5km north-west of the Um Garayat gold mine at Latitude 22o 36' 49.6" N and Longitude 33o 22' 33.9" E. The prospect is easily accessed by an old track originating at the Um Garayat mine.
Historical mining
Previous mining activity is evident with several vertical shafts, an inclined shaft and small waste dumps. An old stone road leads from the wadi to the mine.
Previous geological investigations
In 1904 the Nile Valley Company Limited sunk two vertical shafts and developed two levels at the depths of 15m and 30m. The ore was carted by camel to the nearby Um Garayat mine for processing. Two more shafts were sunk at the northern end of the vein outcrop but they failed to intercept any significant mineralization and were, as a result, abandoned at shallow depths.
Geological setting
The gold occurrence is within a tholeiitic gabbro metamorphosed at greenschist facies in close proximity to a contact with a metavolcanics suite of basalts andesites and dacites.
The gold bearing veins consist mostly of massive bluish-grey quartz, which carry limonite impregnations after pyrite. Wall rock alteration is negligible. Early records reported the grade of the mineralisation to have been 18.6g/t.
Exploration
A programme of RC drilling has been proposed to test the lode at depth.
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