Shaida Copper

Location

• Shaida is situated in the western region of Afghanistan in the Adraskan District of the Herat province, 65km SSW of city of Herat (population c. 398,000) and 50km SSW of Gozareh (population c. 125,000)
• It is anticipated that Gozareh will act as the logistics city for Herat where all modes of transportation will be located e.g. road, air and rail

exploration

• The following activities were completed between 1971 and 1972 by the Soviets with follow-up work on more promising targets:
• Prospecting at a 1:50,000 scale, 600km²;
• Metallometric sampling of deposits, 7,990 samples;
• Heavy concentrate sampling, 144 samples;
• Trenching, 920m³; and
• 12 drillholes at a total depth of 1,511m.
• Additional work was carried out by USGS in 2005 including airborne surveys, hyperspectral surveys and analysis, and the compilation of prior data into a GIS database
• The USGS reports that in the larger USGS defined Dusar-Shaida Area of Interest, there has been some mining. However there is no known historic production from the Shaida licence area

geology and mineralisation

• Shaida’s mineralisation has been described as a porphyry copper deposit
• During the Soviet exploration in 1971 and 1972, several continuous drilled intervals were identified, with copper grades between 0.10 to 0.80%, with drilled intervals ranging from 0.80 to 17.95m
• Cross sections of drilling at the Shaida prospect show layered quartz plagioclase porphyry, quartz keratophyre and aleuropelites (siltstone or mudstone) interbedded with volcanic layers

Infrastructure

• Herat Airport is close to Gozareh and has been used by the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF)
• Railroad terminus station is planned at Gozareh at part of the Afghanistan Railway Development Scheme