Apollo Consolidated believes it has established a strong platform for a new gold mine in the Western Australian goldfields following the latest resource update for its Lake Rebecca project east of Kalgoorlie. 

Apollo (ASX: AOP) released the update on Tuesday, detailing an increase in the optimised and pit-constrained Lake Rebecca Mineral Resource to 29.1 million tonnes at 1.2 g/t Au for 1.105 million ounces.

Although the increase in overall ounces was modest, the key feature of the update was that 74% of the resource – 815,000 ounces at 1.3g/t Au – now falls into the higher confidence Indicated category.

“Apollo has made excellent progress since reporting the maiden Lake Rebecca Mineral Resource in February last year, with infill and resource definition drilling building a very solid endowment of higher confidence ounces,” managing director Nick Castelden said.

“A strong conversion of Inferred to Indicated classification highlights the ongoing geological consistency and confidence in the system, and the updated 1.1M ounce pit-constrained Mineral Resource, including 815,000 ounces at 1.3 g/t Au in the Indicated category, sets the scene for potential +8-year mining and processing scenarios.”

From here, Apollo intends to simultaneously progress approvals and licencing and undertake key metallurgical, geotechnical and environmental works to feed into future mining studies, while also continuing with exploration to grow the project further.

“The company sees plenty of avenues to continue to build the Rebecca resource base and we will progress accelerated testing of a range of exciting value-add drilling targets including for high-grade structures below the existing Rebecca Mineral Resources and into unexplored parts of the tenement package,” Castleden said.

The Lake Rebecca Mineral Resource currently comprises three separate deposits – Rebecca, Duchess and Duke. With 20.4 million tonnes at 1.3 g/t Au for 840,0000 ounces, Rebecca makes the largest contribution.

Assay results are still outstanding for more than 40 reverse circulation drill holes drilled at Rebecca since the Mineral Resource update was compiled.

This drilling was conducted as part of a 25,000m RC and diamond drilling program underway at Lake Rebecca focused on growing known mineralisation and making new discoveries. Apollo has committed to extending the program as required as drilling progresses.

Funding is not an issue for the company, which has $37.1 million in cash and receivables following the sale of its Cote d’Ivoire assets in two separate transactions over the past year.

Most recently, Apollo received $20 million from the sale of its royalty interest over the Seguela gold project in central Cote d’Ivoire to TSX-listed miner Roxgold.

Cote D’Ivoire had been Apollo’s main focus until August 2017 when the first diamond hole drilled into the Laura lode at Rebecca returned intercepts of 17.84m at 15.95 g/t Au from 142m and 49m at 4.57 g/t Au from 166m.

That success was all the encouragement the company needed to turn its attention to its own backyard and the decision appears to be paying off.

 

 

This story was developed in collaboration with Apollo Consolidated, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.

This story does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.

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