REG - Empire Metals Ltd - Drilling to Commence at Pitfield Project

Empire MetalsAnnouncement

13/09/2023 07:15

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RNS Number : 2914M  Empire Metals Limited  13 September 2023

Empire Metals Limited / LON: EEE / Sector: Natural Resources

 

13 September 2023

Empire Metals Limited

('Empire' or the 'Company')

 

Drilling to Commence at Pitfield:

Focusing on the Scale and Structure of the Giant Titanium-Enriched Mineral
System

 

Empire Metals Limited (LON: EEE), the AIM-quoted resource exploration and
development company, is pleased to announce that the first phase of the
Company's next major exploration campaign at the Pitfield Project in Western
Australia ('Pitfield' or the 'Project') is scheduled to commence next week,
with a total of 1,500 metres of Diamond Core drilling planned over the coming
weeks.

 

Highlights

 

·    Major exploration campaign launched to confirm the scale of this
giant, titanium-enriched mineral system and to provide more information about
key parameters such as mineralogy, grades, tonnage potential and geological
controls on the thicker, higher-grade mineralisation.

·    The drilling programme will consist of three angled, 500m deep,
diamond core drill holes focused on confirming the continuation of the
high-grade titanium mineralisation discovered during the Company's maiden
drill campaign.

·    Particular focus on the large, very dense core mapped by airborne
gravity survey which is believed to be indicative of the thicker and
higher-grade parts of this extensively altered, giant titanium-rich mineral
system which extends over 40km x 8km.

·    The highest density areas identified by the airborne gravity survey
are outside areas tested in the maiden drilling campaign, which consisted of
21 Reverse Circulation (RC) holes totalling 3,206 metres.

·    The next phase of RC drilling, scheduled for Q4 2023, will involve a
much larger programme along the length of the high-density gravity core within
the regional magnetics anomaly.

 

Shaun Bunn, Managing Director, said: "I am delighted to announce we are in the
final stages of mobilising our drilling contractor, in readiness to commence
drilling next week the first of the three diamond core holes we have planned
for Pitfield. The diamond core drilling is the first phase of a major
exploration push aimed at understanding the grade, mineralogy, thickness and
extent of this extensively altered, giant titanium-rich mineral system.

 

"The diamond core holes are focussed in areas of known titanium enriched
mineralisation, based on the results of our maiden RC drill campaign, and the
information we will gain from these three, 500m deep, drill cores will be
invaluable in terms of increasing our understanding of the thickness and
geological controls on the titanium mineralisation, as well as providing a
greater insight into the nature of the titanium minerals and their
metallurgical characteristics."

 

The Pitfield Project

Empire holds a 70% interest in Pitfield which is comprised of four granted
Exploration Licences (E70/5465, E70/5876, E70/6320 and E70/6323) covering
1,042km(2). Pitfield is located near Three Springs, a town 313km north of
Perth, Western Australia on the Midlands Road, which until the opening of the
Brand Highway in 1975 was the main road route from Perth to the state's north
(refer Figure 1).

Figure 1.  Pitfield Project Location showing the scale of the magnetics
anomaly and coincident alteration footprint.

 

Regional gravity and magnetics surveys, carried out historically by the
Geological Survey of Western Australia (GSWA), identified strong, extensive
and coincident gravity and magnetics anomalies within the Yandanooka Basin but
lacked detail due to the wide line spacing of these historical surveys.

 

The more detailed airborne magnetics (AM) and airborne electromagnetics (AEM)
surveys undertaken by Empire (announced 21 September 2022) confirmed a
field-mapped massive alteration footprint within the host sedimentary rocks
that was coincident with the historical gravity anomaly and the new, detailed
magnetic and electromagnetic anomalies extending over a 40km north-south
distance (Figure 1).

 

The results of the recent airborne gravity survey have highlighted a
high-density, central core, which is a regional-scale feature, covering an
area ~30km in length and up to 6km wide. The gravity data matches the airborne
magnetics flown by Empire whereby the more magnetic rocks are also located
within the same central core.

 

Planned Diamond Core Drilling Programme

The maiden, reconnaissance RC drilling campaign (announced 30 May 2023) was
focused on areas where Empire had previously identified highly
chargeable-highly resistive anomalies from Induced Polarisation (IP) ground
surveys. This has now been shown to be associated with stratabound iron and
titanium oxide mineralisation hosted within hydrothermally altered
sandstone-siltstone and conglomerate beds. None of these holes was drilled
into any of the discrete high-density anomalies identified from the recent
detailed airborne gravity survey (Figure 2).

Figure 2.  Grey-scale magnetics map overlain by airborne gravity survey
results with indicative highest density zones (solid yellow outlines) and
locations of planned diamond core drill holes and maiden RC drill holes/IP
survey lines.

 

The extensive, high grade titanium mineralisation (between 4% and 10% TiO(2)),
identified in all but one of 21 RC holes previously drilled, has provided
Empire with a globally significant, world class exploration target that
requires diamond core drilling to fully assess its economic potential. The
three diamond core drill holes have been strategically positioned to provide
maximum coverage across the 30km length of the high-density, central core of
the magnetics anomaly (refer Figure 2).

 

Future Work

The gravity data shows a distinct linear gravity high of at least 15km in
length, associated with the very dense rocks, flanking the eastern margin of
the regional gravity anomaly but largely corresponding to rocks of lower
magnetic susceptibility. This is an unexpected outcome which potentially
highlights new zones of concentrated titanium mineralisation. A separate
strong but discrete gravity high also occurs towards the northern end of the
regional gravity core feature. These two gravity highs infer subsurface rock
densities up to four times greater than the surrounding rocks. At the
south-western end of the regional gravity core lies an additional distinct
gravity high that infers rock densities of up to three times that of
surrounding rocks.  These very dense zones may be represented by extensive
concentrated Fe-Ti oxide mineralised beds.

 

The next drill programme, scheduled for late 2023, will involve a significant
RC drilling campaign, which will be carried out along the length of the
high-density gravity core and, in particular, focusing on the very dense zones
that have now been identified within the magnetics anomaly. The objective of
this drill programme is to not only confirm the scale of this giant,
titanium-enriched mineral system but to also understand the distribution of
key factors better, such as grade, mineralogy, thickness and extent of
mineralised beds and controls on high-grade TiO(2) mineralisation.

 

Market Abuse Regulation (MAR) Disclosure

Certain information contained in this announcement would have been deemed
inside information for the purposes of Article 7 of Regulation (EU) No
596/2014, as incorporated into UK law by the European Union (Withdrawal) Act
2018, until the release of this announcement.

 

**ENDS**

 

 

For further information please visit www.empiremetals.co.uk
(http://www.empiremetals.co.uk)   or contact:

 Empire Metals Ltd

 Shaun Bunn / Greg Kuenzel                                                               Tel: 020 4583 1440
 S. P. Angel Corporate Finance LLP (Nomad & Broker)                                      Tel: 020 3470 0470

 Ewan Leggat / Adam Cowl
 Shard Capital Partners LLP (Joint Broker)                                               Tel: 020 7186 9950

 Damon Heath
 St Brides Partners Ltd (Financial                                                       Tel: 020 7236 1177
 PR)

 Susie Geliher / Ana Ribeiro

 

About Empire Metals Limited

Empire Metals is an AIM-listed (LON: EEE) exploration and resource development
company with a project portfolio comprising copper, titanium and gold
interests in Australia and Austria.

 

The Company's strategy is to develop a pipeline of projects at different
stages in the development curve. Its current focus is on the Pitfield Project
in Western Australia, which has demonstrated to contain a newly recognized
giant mineral system that hosts a globally significant titanium discovery.
The Company is also advancing the Eclipse-Gindalbie Project in Western
Australia, which is prospective for high-grade gold and also kaolin used to
produce high-purity alumina, an essential component in lithium-ion batteries.

 

The Company also has two further exploration projects in Australia; the Walton
Project in Western Australia, and the Stavely Project in the Stavely Arc
region of Victoria, in addition to three precious metals projects located in a
historically high-grade gold producing region of Austria.

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