ASX-listed gold explorer Forrestania Resources has hit a suite of high-grade gold intercepts from a recently completed drill program at its British Hill project in Western Australia, including an eye-catching hit of one metre grading an impressive 22.98 grams per tonne (g/t) gold.
The results from the company’s eight-hole, 1858 metre reverse circulation campaign have successfully confirmed that mineralisation extends both up-dip and importantly at depth, setting the stage for a mineral resource estimate upgrade expected to be delivered as soon as within the coming weeks.
Notably, the headline intercept came from 141m downhole with the same hole tossing up a broader four metre zone grading 7.46g/t gold from 124m that included a further eye-catching slice of 22.76g/t from 125m.
Other significant results include a shallow intercept of 7m at 5.69g/t gold from surface, which contained a higher-grade core of 1m at 17.89g/t gold.
Further encouraging hits include 2m at 7.66g/t gold from 274m, with a 1m section going 14.21g/t gold. Another deep intercept cut through 4m at 4.40g/t gold from 277m, including 1m at 10.16g/t gold, while a broader, near-surface zone of 10m at 1.72g/t gold from 33m also landed.
Forrestania is already trucking gold ore sourced from the 54,625 ounces of gold housed at British Hill to its recently acquired and soon-to-be-refurbished Lake Johnston processing facility, 185 kilometres southwest of Kalgoorlie.
The latest drilling success at its British Hill looks to be particularly significant as it feeds directly into a regional development strategy that has been supercharged by a recent string of savvy corporate moves.
The centrepiece of the strategy is the company’s game-changing acquisition of the Edna May gold project from Ramelius Resources. The hefty purchase marked a major milestone in what has been an intense 12-month corporate consolidation blitz across Western Australia’s premier gold fields.
Over the past year, Forrestania has been on an acquisition blitz, snapping up stranded gold assets as it transforms from a grassroots explorer into an emerging producer. The company’s buying spree included a $58.9 million takeover of Kula Gold to secure the high-grade Mt Palmer project, a $24 million acquisition of Newcam Minerals’ Southern Cross assets and a $93.5 million merger with Zenith Minerals.
The Edna May deal gives Forrestania a 2.9-million-tonne-per-annum processing plant, which it intends to use as a central “hub” in a classic hub-and-spoke model.
Operationally, Edna May complements the company's existing Lake Johnston processing plant, where major refurbishment works are already well advanced. Once both are fully operational, Forrestania will control a formidable, combined processing capacity exceeding six million tonnes of ore per annum by early 2027.
The company recently locked away a massive $310 million in fresh equity through a heavily backed, institutional share placement, issuing shares at 40 cents apiece. The raise allowed it to complete the acquisition from Ramelius and fund the refurbishment of its newly acquired Edna May processing plant.
Forrestania has now transitioned from a regional explorer into a serious gold developer with total resources approaching an eye-catching 2 million ounces.
Forrestania Resources chairman David Geraghty said: "These latest results continue to reinforce our confidence in the British Hill deposit, with drilling successfully extending mineralisation both up-dip and at depth while returning multiple high-grade gold intercepts. British Hill is already located on a granted Mining Lease with ore already being trucked to our Lake Johnston processing hub. “
Beyond its two primary processing hubs, the company maintains extensive exposure across highly prospective gold corridors in the Southern Cross, Eastern Goldfields, and flagship Forrestania regions.
The company’s local ground holding covers a dominant 623-square-kilometre contiguous tenure package adjacent to the historic one-million-ounce Bounty gold mine, which forms a key part of its broader 1000-square-kilometre statewide portfolio.
For an explorer, having a clear pathway to monetise a discovery is always the goal. And with high-grade ore from multiple projects such as British Hill set to feed a growing network of processing plants, the company appears to have exactly that.
Forrestania clearly has its ears pinned back as it transforms from explorer to emerging producer in the strike of less than a year. In that time the company has managed to piece together a compelling regional production story and now has its junior explorer days firmly in the rear-view mirror.
Is your ASX-listed company doing something interesting? Contact: matt.birney@businessnews.com.au
By Murray Ward
