Empire Metals Ltd (AIM:EEE) has released assay results of its diamond drill programme at the Eclipse gold project in Western Australia.
The drill programme was the second carried out by Empire at Eclipse and was designed to gather further geological and structural information on the mineralised shear and to test for lodes below the gold-depleted zone of weathering.
The recent drilling has confirmed that the gold mineralisation associated with the northwest-striking and steeply southwest-dipping shear zone extends over a strike length of more than 500 metres (m), an increase in strike length of over 300m.
Six holes for a total of 999m were completed, focused mainly on demonstrating that the gold mineralisation persists at depth around the Eclipse shaft and the Jack's Dream shaft, and to test for continuity along strike between Eclipse and Jack's Dream and to the northwest of Jack's Dream.
Five of the six holes intercepted mineralisation within the Eclipse shear, with significant intercepts reported as follows including 0.54m grading 2.61 grams per tonne (g/t) gold at a depth of just over 138m downhole, and 0.61m grading 1.63 g/t from 164.69m.
Two holes proved the continuity of gold mineralisation to the north-west of the Eclipse shaft, indicating the potential for Jack's Dream mineralisation to link directly to the Eclipse lode.
"We are pleased to report the success of this strategically important diamond drill programme, which has intercepted significant mineralised zones in areas previously under-explored,” said Empire’s managing director Shaun Bunn.
“The geological and structural data being gathered from the analysis of the diamond core will greatly assist in the development of a robust geological model for Eclipse and will allow us to focus our exploration on higher-grade targets along the Eclipse shear. We now look forward to moving the focus of our drilling campaigns to the high-grade lodes recently identified at Homeward Bound and extensions to the Eclipse shear, north-west of Jack's Dream."
The Eclipse gold project is located approximately 55 kilometres north northeast of Kalgoorlie.