Dalaroo Metals is poised to unleash a massive 20,000-metre maiden drilling campaign at its Gold Ridge prospect, part of the Bondoukou gold project in the West African nation of Côte d’Ivoire.
The company says final operational planning is underway, with drill pad preparation slated to kick off in the coming week and the drill rods to start spinning in early August.
The campaign will be in three stages, starting with a 10,000m reverse circulation (RC) drilling program. Phase one will focus on the Wilfred target, the largest of three priority targets the company has identified along a seven-kilometre gold corridor.
First RC holes are planned to reach depths between 100m and 150m testing a host of geological and geochemical targets. Dalaroo says it has chosen RC drilling for the discovery phase because of its faster drilling rate and lower cost. This allows it to test a bigger number of targets to home in on what it considers high priority zones.
The results from this phase will guide a more targeted follow-up diamond drilling campaign with phases two and three planned to include another 10,000m of diamond drilling across all three of the company’s main targets at Gold Ridge, Wilfred, Mag and Ali.
The company’s exploration activities have expanded the Gold Ridge target from a concept into a major seven-kilometre gold-in-soil anomalous corridor. The campaign has been backed by a wealth of exploration data, including soil and auger geochem, geological mapping, rock-chip sampling and the pinpointing of historical artisanal workings.
The company’s next steps include the start of drill pad preparation at Wilfred, pegging the final phase-one drill-hole locations and mobilising the RC rig to site.
Dalaroo Metals chief executive officer John Morgan said: “Our decision to initially concentrate drilling at Wilfred is deliberate and technically driven. Wilfred is the largest of the three priority targets and provides the scale, geological setting and supporting exploration datasets required for a substantial first-phase drilling program.”
Whilst the imminent West African drill campaign is the main event, Dalaroo holds a diverse portfolio of projects across Greenland and Western Australia.
In southern Greenland, the company recently wrapped up its largest-ever field program at its Blue Lagoon rare earths project. The work already completed has upgraded the project from an early-stage concept into what the company says is a well-defined regional rare earth system, with four new prospects identified. More than 200 samples from that program are currently in the lab with upcoming results expected to provide hefty news flow.
Adding another string to its bow, in Western Australia, Dalaroo holds the Lyons River and neighbouring Watheroo projects in the Gascoyne province where it was awarded a government co-funding grant for drilling after confirming the discovery of a gold system there in April.
But with drill pad preparations about to get underway for a 20,000m program at Bondoukou, the company has a firm eye on operations in Côte d’Ivoire. The country is regarded globally as a tier one mining jurisdiction forming part of the highly endowed Birimian greenstone belt of West Africa. And now Dalaroo is about to get a serious look at what might lurk beneath the surface under its feet on land that hosts some of the world’s largest gold deposits.
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By Murray Ward
