DFR Gold Inc, the joint venture partner of Panthera Resources PLC (AIM:PAT), has commenced a 10,000-metre drilling programme on the Cascades project in Burkina Faso, West Africa.
The first 5,000 metres of the programme will target extensions to the current resources and several new targets, including two newly defined targets immediately north and southwest of the Daramandougou resource pit shell.
The second phase will be a results-driven follow-on programme targeting the highest priority results from the first phase.
Back in 2021, DFR established a maiden mineral resource estimate on the property amounting to 264,000 ounces indicated and 371,000 ounces inferred.
The Cascades project lies in the Banfora Birimian Greenstone Belt, one of the three major mineralized belts in western Burkina Faso.
Gold mineralization at the Cascades project is spatially associated with sulfides and quartz sericite alteration.
The Cascades project was formerly called Labola and is owned and managed by Moydow Holdings Ltd.
Panthera currently holds an equity interest of 20% in Moydow, with DFR earning an 80% interest. DFR has agreed to spend up to US$18mln as earn-in on Cascades, although Panthera does have a buy-back option for a certain percentage.
More than 65,500 metres of historical drilling has been completed across multiple drilling campaigns at Cascades by previous owners High River Gold Mines Limited, later acquired by Nord Gold PLC, and Taurus Gold Limited. Mineralisation has been intercepted by historical drilling and outlined by previous artisanal mining in three main zones over a 10-kilometre strike length.