Brightstar Resources Ltd has kicked off the 2025 drilling program at the newly acquired Sandstone Gold Project in Western Australia’s Murchison region as it seeks to grow the existing 1.5-million-ounce resource base and target new exploration discoveries.
This drilling, which forms part of a larger 55,000-metre RC drilling program planned at the consolidated Sandstone Gold Project, will start at the Lord Nelson and Vanguard North deposits, following on from Brightstar’s first Sandstone drilling program at the end of 2024.
The company is also planning significant diamond drilling programs to begin at the project later in the first half of 2025.
Exploration goals
Brightstar’s managing director Alex Rovira said “We are excited to kick off our 2025 drilling programs at our consolidated Sandstone Project.
"Brightstar’s geology and engineering teams have been working diligently since the Alto and Montague East acquisitions completed, planning aggressive exploration programs to meet our exploration goals of growing the total mineral resource beyond the current 1.5 million ounces at 1.5 g/t gold and increasing confidence classification to underpin mining studies to advance the projects towards mining opportunities.”
Drilling plans
Brightstar’s initial drilling location will be Lord Nelson, with about 3,000 metres of RC drilling planned to complete the program started in December 2024.
The ‘Lords’ project area comprising the proximal Lord Nelson and Lord Henry deposits hosts a resource of 400,000 ounces at 1.6 g/t gold, with the initial program aiming to infill and upgrade the resource inside optimised pit shells.
Drilling will then move to the Vanguard Camp, which hosts a high-grade open pittable gold resource of 200,000 ounces at 4.5 g/t gold, with the 4,000-metre program aiming to extend and infill the Vanguard North resource.
RC drilling has commenced at the Lord Nelson and Vanguard Camp deposits.
Further drilling
Following the initial programs, further RC and diamond drilling will be completed across the enlarged Sandstone Hub, targeting resource upgrades and extensions, as well as systematically testing the numerous early-stage exploration targets across the package.
Alongside this significant drilling program at Sandstone, large-scale, RC, diamond and aircore drilling programs are planned at the Menzies and Laverton hubs which are scheduled to begin towards the end of the March quarter of 2025.
Encouraging pipeline
"The pipeline of advanced exploration targets across the package is particularly encouraging, and we aim to test many of these in the current program,” Rovira said.
"Drilling will also continue across the other hubs at Laverton and Menzies, where development studies remain ongoing. Those drilling programs will assist in building robust future mining operations at the more advanced projects.”
Next steps
Brightstar will release drilling information and assays as they are received, including the outstanding results from 2024 drilling. These include:
- RC drilling results from the Montague-Boulder, Whistler and Lord Nelson deposits (Sandstone Hub); and
- Diamond drilling results from the Lord Byron deposit (Jasper Hills–Laverton Hub).
Meanwhile, work continues on a definitive feasibility study and development activities at Brightstar’s second mining operation, the Fish underground mine (Laverton Hub), to complement the Second Fortune Mine.