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2024 Activities - Perseus, a High-Grade Nickel Discovery
Exploration work in 2024 comprised a prospecting phase (303 grab samples and 40 channel samples) and an infill lake sediment sampling survey (215 samples). This work led to the discovery of a high-grade nickel zone (“Perseus”) on the Kukamas property. Additional work is ongoing to further delineate the zone, including a magnetic and electromagnetic (“EM”) ground survey. Budgeting and planning are underway to initiate a maiden drilling program.
The Perseus Zone is associated with an ultramafic volcanic unit and its features indicate a highly fertile system, underscoring the property’s excellent prospectivity.
- Best grades reach up to 9.35% Ni, 3.04% Cu, 3.78 g/t Pt and 8.99 g/t Pd from different sawed samples.
- Perseus is spatially linked to a north-trending string of strong EM conductors, 2 kilometres long, which correlates well with a strong nickel-copper-cobalt footprint in lake sediments.
- High-grade mineralization defines a curvilinear steeply dipping, north- to southwest-trending outcropping zone, measuring approximately 56 metres long by up to 9 metres wide.
- Perseus appears open along strike and to the east. Thick overburden surrounding the mineralized zone limited the extent of the sampling coverage.
- Other significant ultramafic bodies remain underexplored on the 41-kilometre-long property.
The rock samples collected from the discovery outcrop comprise twenty-four (24) 1-metre-long channel samples from two (2) channels, each 12 metres long, and twenty (20) grab samples cut with a saw. Channels were cut perpendicularly to the orientation of the mineralized zone. Note that grab samples are selective by nature and unlikely to represent average grades.
Channel #1: Oriented N90o; total horizontal length of 12.0 metres, including two (2) offset samples taken 4.9 m south of the main channel due to a local outcrop discontinuity along the main channel.
- 2.98% Ni, 0.32% Cu, 2.25 g/t PGE over 8.0 m (sample G435436 to sample G435431) including 3.74% Ni, 0.41% Cu and 2.82 g/t PGE over 6.0m
Channel #2: Oriented N150o; total horizontal length of 12.0 m.
- 1.10% Ni, 0.15% Cu, 1.02 g/t PGE over 9.0 m (sample G435426 to sample G435417), including 1.42% Ni, 0.19% Cu, and 1.36 g/t PGE over 6.0 m
Mineralization consists of semi-massive to disseminated sulphides, mostly pentlandite, pyrrhotite and chalcopyrite, hosted in ultramafic rocks, likely komatiitic volcanics and peridotite. The sulphide-rich mineralization occurs as a matrix in brecciated rocks and occasionally as veinlets. The breccia seems bounded to the west by net-textured disseminated mineralization, suggesting a west-facing sequence, which matches the stratigraphic findings from mapping work. The breccia may correspond to an autoclastic basal breccia. The volcanic nature of the host rocks is indicated by the fine-grained to aphanitic textures, possible pillow lavas, and an interflow contact positioned several metres west of the mineralized zone. The curvilinear shape of the Perseus Zone may correspond to an embayment at the base of the ultramafic flow, a shape often observed in komatiitic nickel deposits.
The geological and mineralization features, along with geochemical data, suggest similarities with Archean Kambalda-type komatiitic nickel deposits (examplified by the Kambalda district, Western Australia). At Perseus, the geochemical criteria notably include:
- High MgO contents (from 24.5% to 37.8%) in the rocks proximal to mineralization.
Based on 38 samples with nickel grades ranging from 0.3% Ni to 9.35% Ni:
- High Ni/Cu ratios (from 1.4 to 68.7; 10.3 on average); and
- High Pd/Pt ratios (from 1.10 to 11.82; 3.36 on average).
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2023 Activities
Exploration work in 2023 comprised 3,199 line-kilometres of heliborne geophysical survey and an initial prospecting phase.
- Geophysical survey: A high-resolution heliborne magnetic-electromagnetic VTEMTMPlus survey covered the entire property at 100-metre line spacing for a total of 3,199 line-kilometres (see press release of February 8, 2023). Ten target areas have been identified related to strong to moderate VTEMTMPlus conductors or strings of conductors, as well as smaller isolated EM anomalies. None of these conductors, often well correlated with outcropping gold, copper and/or nickel mineralization, has been drill-tested.
- Prospecting: The main objective of this phase of work was to follow up on several geophysical targets identified. 114 rock grab samples were collected from six (6) target areas, leading to the discovery of an amphibolite-hosted nickel-copper-platinum-palladium showing with pyrrhotite, pentlandite and chalcopyrite veinlets that returned up to 1.36% Ni, 0.12% Cu, 0.206 g/t Pt and 0.685 g/t Pd in grab samples.
A strong spatial correlation exists between the new nickel-copper-PGE showing and a kilometre-long strong electromagnetic conductor that remains untested by drilling. Other historical prospects in the same area yielded up to 2.0% Cu and 0.75% Ni in grab samples. This area has been ranked as a priority for additional prospecting in 2024 and likely diamond drilling.
A new gold showing (4.28 g/t Au in a grab sample of pyritic amphibolite) has been identified along the Chain Lake fault, a multi-kilometre-long wide shear zone previously recognized on the property. This target area presents a string of strong punctual electromagnetic conductors over a 6-kilometre strike on the western claim block, which will be subject to additional prospecting work.
Several other highly prospective target sectors have been flagged for first-pass field assessment, including a 12-kilometre-long gold-copper trend along the northern part of the western claim block. Historical showings delivered up to 12.54 g/t Au and 3.30% Cu in grab samples.
Azimut acquired the Kukamas property after identifying one of the strongest geochemical footprints for copper-gold systems in the James Bay region. The footprint is characterized by strong regional lake-bottom sediment signatures that include 232.8 ppm Cu, 0.39 ppm Ag, 65.7 ppm As, 1.17 ppm Sb. Numerous prospects also sit on or adjacent to Kukamas, with historical grab samples collected on the property grading up to 10.63 g/t Au and 20.7 % Cu. Several other gold showings are found nearby (Tour Elle: 18.1 g/t Au; Girard-Dupras: 3.6 g/t Au over 1.0 m (channel); La Guiche Zone: 2.72 g/t Au; and Dune Zone: 2.2 g/t Au, 4.3% Cu).
