History & Location
The P-4 Project is located in Porter Township, approximately 5 km NE of the Shakespeare Mine (Fig. 1). It can be accessed by a trail from the Shakespeare Mine or by Agnew Lake on foot. It is comprised of a series of staked claims and has seen limited exploration prior to 2021. In the mid-2000’s, Ursa Major conducted a regional exploration program which consisted of a series of 9 holes to the east, west and north of the P-4 nickel-copper-PGM discovery. Hole U-07-05, located approximately 950 meters from the P-4 Discovery hole, intersected 4.6 meters of 0.09% Ni., 0.18% Cu., and 0.23 grams Pt+Pd+Au in 2004. This hole was the first definitive evidence supporting the belief that this portion of the property had potential to host nickel-copper-PGM deposits.
In 2015, an airborne geophysical survey was flown over the P-4 area, with magnetic, gravity and electromagnetic surveys being completed. From this data, two anomalies were identified and electromagnetic plates were modeled. The first two holes at P-4 were drilled in August 2021 to test the western most plate, with both holes intersecting nickel, copper, cobalt and precious metal mineralization (see News Release September 20th, 2021). In November 2021, downhole geophysics was conducted on these two holes which extended the electromagnetic plate 230m below the deepest drill hole intersection (see News Release, December 1st, 2021). Follow-up drilling is warranted and will be conducted in 2022.
Fig. 1 Location of the P-4 Discovery, 5km North East of the Shakespeare Mine
Geology
The area surrounding the Shakespeare property is underlain predominantly by units of the Huronian-aged Mississagi quartzite (sedimentary units) and Nipissing gabbroic intrusives, which trend approximately north-northeast and dip moderately to steeply north. The Mississagi quartzite’s dominate the north and south limit of the land package. The ultimate east and west limits for the Nipissing gabbro intrusive have not been confirmed. The north and south limits of the intrusion are bounded by the Mississagi quartzite, and the contact between the gabbro and the quartzite is locally sheared and altered, representing an environment conducive to intrusive hosted mineralisation.
The Shakespeare Mine itself is located along the contact between these sedimentary rocks and the Nipissing Gabbro, and the mineralisation is interpreted as being hosted in a melagabbro intrusive. The melagabbro hosting the mineralized zones at the Shakespeare Mine is thought to be a magma injection along this contact of the gabbro and the quartzites.
P-4 is hypothesised to be part of the same system as the Shakespeare Mine, representing an extension of the contact between the sedimentary rocks and the Nipissing gabbro. However, at P-4, the mineralised intersections are interpreted as a magma injection directly into the sediments, having originated along the contact of the gabbro and the sedimentary quartzites at depth. The location of P-4 mineralisation within a sedimentary system opens up the potential for the discovery of a significant sulphide deposit at this location. This thesis is explored in more detail in the exploration potential section below.
Exploration Potential
The P-4 discovery is completely open for expansion and located in a similar setting to the Shakespeare deposit. The P-4 discovery holes, located 950 metres from mineralized historic intersections, support the thesis that P-4 could be part of a system with a significant geographical footprint.
The large, untested region of gabbroic rocks in contact with sedimentary rocks at P-4 represents a significant prospective area for the discovery of further mineralisation. In the area surrounding the P-4 discovery there is over 3km of strike length of Shakespeare style rocks. The area surrounding the P-4 discovery represents repetition of the Shakespeare geological setting, and the 3km strike length identified so far indicates that the system could host another deposit of similar size to Shakespeare.
The discovery of the P-4 mineralization within a sedimentary rock type (rather than at the contact like the Shakespeare deposit) provides the environment for of a semi massive or massive sulphide deposit that is typical of the Sudbury region. When the gabbroic magma assimilates sedimentary rocks, they can absorb sulphur from those rocks. If the gabbroic magma is of the right geochemistry, then metals such as Cu, Ni, Co, Au, Pd, & Pt can attach themselves to the sulphur from the sediments and start to precipitate as sulphides within the gabbro magma, ultimately forming a sulphide deposit. At P-4 the discovery holes show mineralization occurring within a gabbroic intrusive cutting through sedimentary rocks and forming semi-massive sulphides. At this time there is nothing to show that the remainder of the sedimentary-gabbroic contact cannot duplicate these finding and contain more mineralization.
When sulphide deposits of this type form, they tend to be highly responsive to identification from electromagnetic surveys. The mineralization at P-4 has now been identified through three different EM surveys, with the most recent downhole EM survey indicating that the conductivity at P-4 strengthens at depth.
Recent News for the P-4 Discovery