Rockfire Resources plc (LON: ROCK), the gold and base metal exploration company, is pleased to announce that the Company’s 100% owned Plateau Gold Deposit, in Queensland Australia, has surpassed a JORC (2012) Mineral Resource of 200,000 ounces of gold.
This represents a 515% increase in gold ounces since the Company’s maiden JORC (2012) Mineral Resource reported previously in July 2019.
Highlights of the Plateau JORC Mineral Resource:
· The overall gold envelope at Plateau (grades above 0.2 g/t Au) has resulted in an Indicated and Inferred Mineral Resource of:
11.4 Million tonnes @ 0.6 g/t Au and 4.0 g/t Ag
208,278 ounces of gold and 1.5 Million ounces of silver . *
· Within this envelope, and using a higher cut-off (grades above 0.5 g/t Au), the Indicated and Inferred Mineral Resource is:
3.9 Million tonnes @ 1.1 g/t Au and 6.4 g/t Ag
131,302 ounces of gold and 800,000 ounces of silver. **
· Using the same 0.5 g/t Au cut-off, a subset of the Mineral Resource at shallow depths (0-100 m) is comprised 81% in the Indicated category and 19% in the Inferred category and could potentially form an early, open cut mining opportunity.
1.4 Million tonnes @ 1.2 g/t Au and 8.8 g/t Ag
53,336 ounces of gold and 390,000 ounces of silver.
· The above 53,336 ounces of gold could conceivably form a low cost, early, open cut mining operation and Rockfire is working vigorously to pursue such opportunity. Any future production could benefit from Plateau being in proximity (within 50 km) of several operating gold processing plants by minimising capital costs for mine development.
· The Mineral Resource category and classification has also resulted in an upgrade of +37% of the gold ounces into the higher confidence Indicated level, using a 0.2 g/t Au cut-off.
· The Mineral Resource remains open along strike and at depth, leaving scope for significant, further Resource increases. Within 200 m to the north and south of Plateau, rock chip sampling has returned 12.10 g/t Au and 6.69 g/t Au, respectively. Both areas are undrilled and are not included in the current Mineral Resource estimate.
· The Company is planning additional shallow drilling in the top 100 m from surface to infill and extend near-surface gold. Deep drilling at Plateau is not expected until a gravity survey, planned for April 2021, is completed. This survey is being designed to confirm a target at depths beyond 500 m.
· Rockfire’s discovery cost, based on the recent drilling and Mineral Resource is approximately £6 GBP/ounce of gold. This confirms that Rockfire is a prudent and consistent, low-cost explorer.
Table 1: Plateau Combined Classification scheme, with variable Tonnes and Grade estimate 2020
* Please refer to Table 2 below.
** Please refer to Table 3 below.
David Price, Chief Executive Officer of Rockfire, commented:
“This outstanding resource upgrade demonstrates the quality of the Plateau asset . I am particularly pleased that we have delineated near-surface gold, at an average grade of 1.2 g/t Au. This represents real potential for Rockfire to achieve its ambition of near-term, open cut gold production whilst the deposit continues to be expanded through further exploration.”
“Using the higher cut-off grade of 0.5 g/t Au, the deposit maintains an overall average grade of 1.05 g/t Au. Silver is expected to add value to the economics of any future production, with silver commonly being produced simultaneously with gold in the carbon-in-pulp (“CIP”) extraction process.”
“This is just the beginning of Plateau and we see opportunity for more resources along strike to the east and west, as well as repetitions of the favourable geological and structural setting in the immediate vicinity of Plateau. Within 200 m to the north of Plateau, rock chip sampling has returned 12.10 g/t Au and similarly, 200 m south of Plateau, rocks have returned 6.69 g/t Au. Both areas are undrilled.”
“The depth potential of Plateau remains wide open for a significant discovery. Rockfire has only drilled two holes at depth and both have intersected good gold grades. BPL041 hit 9.2 g/t Au at 409 m below surface and hole BPL040, hit 2.5 g/t Au at 639.25 m depth. These intercepts are 175 m apart and are considered by Rockfire geologists to be an outstanding success and bodes very well for a significant gold discovery.”
“Rockfire is striving to monetise Plateau and we are working hard to achieve this for the benefit of our shareholders. We are very pleased with progress to date and will continue to push rigorously ahead with exploration at Plateau, pursuing our ambition for early gold production. We will keep the market up to date as our work progresses.”
