Tietto Minerals Ltd's (ASX:TIE) latest infill drilling results further enhance the company’s plans to grow open pit gold resources at Abujar-Pischon-Golikro (APG) deposit, part of the Abujar Gold Project in Cote d'Ivoire West Africa.
Ongoing strong results have seen Tietto extend the current diamond drilling program to May 24 and the company now expects to deliver the Abujar mineral resource update by the end of the June quarter.
Latest results include:
- 15 metres at 2.25 g/t from 123 metres, including 1-metre at 25.53 g/t;
- 13 metres at 1.61 g/t from 47 metres, including 1-metre at 16 g/t;
- 17 metres at 0.95 g/t from 15 metres including 6 metres at 1.71 g/t; and
- 15 metres at 0.96 g/t from 16 metres including 2 metres at 2.82 g/t.
Tietto has completed a further 277 holes for 48,453 metres across Abujar since the drilling cut-off date of the October 2020 resource update.
Drill teams are on track to complete more than 2,500 metres by May 24 for inclusion in the model update.
“More strong numbers”
Managing director Dr Caigen Wang said: “We have more strong numbers coming out of our infill drilling at APG, with the latest round of assay results delivering shallow open-pittable gold intercepts.
“On the back of these continuing good assay results from APG, we have decided to extend the drilling cut-off to May 24 to incorporate these into the next Abujar resource model update expected to be delivered by the end of the current quarter.
“I think it is fair to say that APG has naturally been overshadowed by AG core.
“However, our expanded project delivered with the PFS demonstrated the potential of APG to deliver shallow low strip open-pittable feedstock for an established mill and mining operation at AG.
“During the next phase of work planned in the DFS, our mining team will assess the opportunity to build on the conservative assumptions used in the PFS, such as the fresh processing costs and mill throughput rates.”
Tietto’s infill diamond drilling program is targeting the conversion of inferred resources to indicated resources at AG and APG.
The new updated resource model will be used for ore reserve studies in the upcoming definitive feasibility study (DFS) due in quarter three.
Increase in reserves expected
Wang added: “I expected that once we combine the updated Abujar mineral resource with the enhancements identified in the PFS, we will see a material increase in our ore reserves Abujar following new mine optimisation and mine scheduling activities.
“Once the infill program is competed, we intend to use our diamond drill rigs to test the multitude of exploration targets around our proposed mill at Abujar to drive future resource growth.”
Assays remain pending with more than 5,400 Abujar core samples at the laboratory.
The company is well-funded to drive Abujar resource growth and project development with around $52 million cash in the bank at the end of the March quarter.