Tietto Minerals Limited (ASX: TIE) has reported further high‐grade gold results from the Abujar‐Gludehi (AG) deposit, part of its 3Moz Abujar Gold Project in Côte d’Ivoire, West Africa.
Significant results include 6m @ 6.27 g/t Au from 389m includes 1m @ 25.19 g/t Au within 14m @ 2.94 g/t Au from 384m from diamond hole ZDD410; and 2m @ 8.82 g/t Au from 48m includes 1m @ 17.17 g/t Au and 7m @ 3.68 g/t Au from 63 m includes 5m @ 4.88 g/t Au from diamond hole ZDD413
The company said that the 28,000m infill drilling program designed to increase mineral resource confidence categories for resource update is due end of May 2021.
TIE said that the geotechnical drill program is progressing well and the Abujar PFS and maiden reserve delivery is expected by end of Q1 2021.
Tietto said that its six diamond drill rigs are active at Abujar with plans to aggressively drill throughout 2021 to deliver rapid resource growth at low discovery cost per ounce.
Abujar project
Tietto’s Abujar Gold Project is located in Côte d’Ivoire, West Africa. The current Abujar JORC mineral resource of 3.02Moz includes resources from three deposits hosted within the Central Corridor: AG (Abujar Gludehi): 49.6Mt at 1.5 g/t Au for 2.3Moz; APG (Abujar Pischon and Golikro): 31Mt at 0.7g/t Au for 0.7Moz; and SG (South Gamina): 0.5Mt at 1.4g/t Au for 0.02Moz.
The combined strike length of these three prospects accounts for approximately 10% of the overall strike length of the 70km mineralised Abujar gold corridor.
Diamond drilling at Abujar
The company had announced that it is undertaking 70,000m of systematic diamond drilling across its tenure design to grow existing resources and test new prospects identified by its exploration team. The 70,000m diamond drilling program includes 28,000m of infill drilling and 2,500m geotechnical drilling.
Geotechnical drilling
The company said that the geotechnical drill program of 2,500m is progressing well, with six holes completed for 1,267.5m. TIE said that the holes were designed to deliver data for developing a rock mass model that will be used to provide pit slope information for the Feasibility Study. The company said that once all holes are completed, they will be logged and intervals selected for physical testwork to establish the rock mass model.
Infill drilling
Tietto said that it has now completed 28 holes for 7,134.5m (more than 25%) of the 28,000m diamond drilling infill program. Assay results for 7 holes of the 28 holes drilled to date (part of 28,000m infill program) have now been reported.
High-grade assays from infill drilling
Tietto has reported 40 high‐grade gold intercepts over 50 gold gram metres from drilling within the high‐grade core at AG. The company said that the high‐grade gold mineralisation remains open along strike and at depth.
Important results are shown below.
Updates and next steps
Tietto said that it plans to drill more holes along strike at AG, as well as further step‐back drilling to test the depth limits of this large high‐grade gold system.
The company noted that it now has six company‐owned and operated diamond drill rigs working 24/7 at Abujar on these drill programs. The company said that it anticipates completing the infill drilling program by mid‐April 2021. TIE said that the assays and geological information from this program will be used for the Company’s 5th resource model update, due for delivery by end of May 2021, and to be used for mine scheduling studies in the DFS (Q3 2021).
The company said that further infill and extensional drilling is planned and is in the process of being executed. Tietto said that it continues towards delivery of milestones during 2021 including a Pre‐Feasibility Study (PFS) for Abujar, which is on track for release in Q1 CY2021.
TIE reported that it is well funded with $57M cash at bank to complete Abujar project milestones including PFS, DFS, and order long lead items to accelerate project development.
Management comments
Tietto Managing Director Dr. Caigen Wang said: “I am pleased to report further high‐grade intervals at AG, with ZDD410 delivering 6m @ 6.27 g/t Au from 389m part of our 28,000m infill program scheduled to finish in mid‐April 2021. It is a good result, correlating well with the drilling above and below. We will release further drilling results as assays become available.
The infill drilling was designed to target inferred material in the current resource model, which is on track for an update in May 2021. The updated model will be used to underpin the DFS which is due in Q3 2021. Work on the PFS continues and we expect to report the results and a maiden reserve towards the end of the current quarter.”