MINING company Arcon International is confident that the "K Zone" lead and zinc deposit adjacent to the mine it is developing at Galmoy, Co Kilkenny, contains over 1 million tonnes of ore. Mr Tony O'Reilly Junior, the deputy chief executive of Arcon, said the company expected that the K Zone deposits would turn out to be at least that size when its dimensions are finally established by the current phase of exploratory drilling.

Mr O'Reilly made the prediction after the publication of the latest drilling results from Galmoy. Arcon is currently constructing a mine to extract 6.5 million tonnes of ore from two deposits at Galmoy called the CW and G ore bodies. The K Zone is 230 metres from the mine currently under construction.