Liberty Star Uranium & Metals Corp. (OTCQB:LBSR) (dba Liberty Star Minerals) said on Tuesday it has staked additional mineral exploration permits in Arizona, expanding its land position around the Hay Mountain project as the company seeks to advance targets for gold and other critical minerals.
The US-based exploration company said it has secured 13 additional mineral exploration permits covering just over 11 square miles in the Tombstone Mining District in southeast Arizona.
The new claims increase Liberty Star’s total mineralized footprint in the area to just over 31 square miles, making its Hay Mountain Holdings land package the fourth-largest mineral footprint in Arizona, the company said.
The newly staked permits expand the company’s contiguous land position surrounding Liberty Star Hay Mountain Holdings LLC, which includes Earp Ridge Mines LLC, a multi-mineral claim package containing copper, molybdenum and other critical minerals historically associated with the Hay Mountain Target 1 and 2 zones, as well as Red Rock Mines LLC, the company’s gold exploration target.
Liberty Star said the additional permits were staked to capture potential extensions of known structural and geophysical trends identified through recent geological mapping, sampling and induced polarization surveys.
“Over the last year, our technical team has continued to deliver compelling evidence that we are in a large, mineralized system with bonanza-grade gold values and robust geophysical signatures at Red Rock Canyon and across the entire Hay Mountain Holdings umbrella,” Chairman Pete O’Heeron said in a statement.
The company added that the expanded land position is intended to preserve flexibility for potential open-pit and underground development scenarios and to secure additional targets along regional structures that could host gold and polymetallic mineralization.
Liberty Star’s projects lie within Arizona’s porphyry copper belt in the state’s southeast, a region known for large copper-gold-molybdenum deposits and considered a major US source of copper and other critical minerals.
The company said it plans to continue advancing exploration at Red Rock Canyon and across the broader Hay Mountain area, including designing follow-up drilling programs, expanding geochemical sampling and refining 3D interpretations of geophysical data.