Altus intercepts 'significant' gold zone in Mali drilling

Altus Strategies announced the intersection of a “significant” gold zone from reverse circulation (RC) drilling at the Lakanfla Central prospect on the Lakanfla licence on Tuesday.

The AIM-traded firm said Lakanfla forms part of its wholly-owned, 105 square kilometre Diba and Lakanfla gold project in western Mali.

It is located about five kilometres east of its Diba licence, which hosts numerous gold prospects, including a shallow-dipping, near-surface gold deposit.

The company said the 3,500 metre RC programme was underway, with the intersected zone including 1.23 grams of gold per tonne over 127 metres from 21 metres, including 2.53 grams per tonne over 14 metres from 46 metres.

Assays had been received from the first two holes of the planned 22-hole programme, which Altus said was designed to test the strike and down-dip potential of the Lakanfla Central prospect, and confirm historical drilling results from other key prospects.

Those historical results included 5.1 grams of gold per tonne over 26 metres from 32 metres, 4.31 grams per tonne over 18 metres from 34 metres, and 1.02 grams per tonne over 60 metres from 105 metres.

The company said the drilling could also generate a maiden mineral resource estimate for Lakanfla.

“Lakanfla Central is one of at least four key prospects at Lakanfla, with gold mineralisation hosted in a number of sub-vertical breccia zones within a significant porphyritic granite, which has a current strike length of approximately 350 metres,” said chief executive officer Steven Poulton.

“Lakanfla also hosts a number of widespread zones of intense hard rock artisanal workings.

“Once completed, the results from the combined drilling programme at Diba and Lakanfla will feed into an updated independent mineral resource estimate, and preliminary economic assessment for the project.”

At 1049 GMT, shares in Altus Strategies were up 3.04% at 57.7p.