Chaarat describes extensive progress at Tulkubash

Gold mining company Chaarat Gold Holdings released further drilling results from its ongoing 2019 exploration and drilling programme at Tulkubash in the Kyrgyz Republic on Tuesday, which was set to become its second operating gold mine, scheduled to start production in 2021.

The AIM-traded firm said an additional 8,100 metres had been drilled since the last exploration update on 28 August, explaining that assays were pending from 25 drill holes and from “extensive” lengths of road-cut sampling, which would be compiled and interpreted as they were received.

It said the primary objective of the drilling programme was to identify shallow mineralisation within and near the current pit designs, and to extend mineralisation along strike to the northeast.

The current year's programme formed part of a multi-year drilling programme, the board said, focussed on adding further reserves, with the long-term objective of demonstrating a mine life of at least 15 years at the Tulkubash Project.

Chaarat said it expected to publish an update to the Tulkubash Mineral Resource estimate before year-end 2019, which would form the basis for an update to the Tulkubash Reserve estimate and economic model during the first quarter of 2020.

Drilling since the August update had focused on the prospective Shir Canyon area, representing the strike extension to the northeast from the 2018 year-end resource boundary.

The company said it was an area where road-cut sampling earlier in the season identified numerous areas of anomalous - in cases, ore-grade - gold geochemistry at surface.

Assays from much of that drilling remained pending, but encouraging results received to date include DH19T508, with 13.5 metres at 0.81 grams per tonne of gold starting at 36.0 metres; DH19T528, with 15.0 metres at 1.00 grams per tonne of gold starting at 19.5 metres and 21.0 metres at 0.58 grams per tonne of gold starting at 78.0 metres; and DH19T535, with 28.5 metres at 0.99 grams per tonne of gold starting at 6.0 metres.

It also included DH19T536, with 7.5 metres at 1.75 grams per tonne of gold starting at 16.5 metres; DH19T544, with 6.0 metres at 1.59 grams per tonne of gold starting at 7.5 metres and 4.5 metres at 3.23 grams per tonne of gold starting at 37.5 metres; and DH19T556, with 7.5 metres at 3.56 grams per tonne of gold starting at 166.0 metres.

The board said it should be noted that the holes were drilled at shallow angles, with the depth of the intercepts from surface “considerably less” than down-hole drill depth.

Roadcut and outcrop mapping and sampling northeast along strike from the current resource boundary had extended the broad area of more-than-one gram per tonne in rock chip samples described in the August release by about 450 metres to the northeast.

A new high-grade target had been identified in the Shir Canyon area, with a road cut sample reported earlier - two metres of 19.67 grams per tonne of gold within eight metres of 5.12 grams per tonne of gold, was now interpreted as occurring in Chaarat Formation shales.

Initial metallurgical testing indicated that it could represent mineralisation that was leachable, but higher grade than typical Tulkubash mineralisation.

Work on that target had just started, the board said, but initial drill results were said to be “encouraging”.

District-scale exploration was continuing to identify and validate new gold targets, supporting the hypothesis that the 24 kilometre Tulkubash Exploration License was an emerging gold district with the potential to host numerous gold deposits.

During 2019, 120 holes had been drilled to date, totalling around 19,500 metres, with the five remaining holes of the year’s campaign in progress, set to be completed by the end of October.

That would bring the total drilling for the year to about 20,000 metres, in line with the company’s previous guidance.

The firm said the current drilling included an initial approximate 1,000 metre programme in the Karator and Ishakuldy areas, 1.5 kilometres and 5 kilometres northeast of the current resource limits respectively.

Chaarat siad the programme was designed to begin testing drill targets identified along strike, and to validate the district-scale potential of Tulkubash, which was expected to continue in 2020.

It noted that no exploration drilling was scheduled during the winter months.

“We are encouraged by our results to date this year: infill and step-out drilling within and adjacent to the currently defined Resource, exploration drilling in a new target area - Shir Canyon - and ongoing district-scale reconnaissance exploration are all providing encouraging results,” said Chaarat Gold’s senior vice-president of exploration Dusty Nicol.

“The resource identified to date lies within only four kilometres of the company's 24 kilometre-long exploration licence.

“Beyond this, Shir Canyon represents the potential strike extension to the northeast of our current resource boundary.”

Nicol said drill testing within the broad area of more-than-one gram per tonne of gold mineralisation identified on surface had defined four gold lodes over a strike length of about 320 metres, and remained open along strike to the northeast.

“Much of the assay data from drilling in this area is still pending, but results received to date are encouraging.

“We have also commenced the initial drill testing of targets at Karator and Ishakuldy this season.

“Additional trenching and road cut sampling in these targets continue to identify areas of hydrothermal alteration and anomalous geochemistry which has already identified numerous additional drill targets for follow up in future drill seasons.”

Dusty Nicol explained that the company was continuing to integrate field mapping and drill data with satellite imagery and geochemical data to identify multiple new target areas throughout the exploration license.

“Our objective remains to continue developing a database of these geological and geochemical data that will allow the application of advanced data handling techniques to optimise ongoing exploration and discovery.

“The database being developed will lend itself to the application of artificial intelligence [and] machine learning to identify new drill targets.”