New drill and rock chip assays together with an interpretation of ground gravity data have identified new drill targets along the Welcome Jack Trend, located 1.5 km east of the Commonwealth-Silica Hill area at Impact Minerals Ltd’s 100%-owned Commonwealth project, 100 km north of Orange in New South Wales.

These drill targets will be tested as part of an upcoming drill programme that will also follow up exceptional gold and silver results recently returned from the Silica Hill prospect. The drill program should commence by late June subject to approvals.

The new assay results demonstrate high grade gold and silver is associated with barite (barium sulphate) and linear zones of silicification over a strike length of at least 2,000 m along the Welcome Jack Trend. In the south these zones occur around the margins of a diorite intrusion exposed at surface.

Impact has previously shown that barite is an important pathfinder element for the exploration model proposed for the Commonwealth project; that is, gold-rich volcanogenic massive sulphide mineralisation similar to the Eskay Creek deposit in British Columbia (>3 Moz of gold and 180 Moz of silver;) and potentially underlain by a porphyry copper-gold system. However, barite is costly to assay for and not done routinely.