Arika outlines new gold targets at Kookynie

• Arika expands target pipeline with 17 new discoveries
• Extensional and in-fill soil sampling will be undertaken over key prospect areas to further refine priority targets ahead of future drilling
• Meanwhile, drilling at Yundamindra is set to begin this week

Special report: Arika Resources has identified 17 new targets using ultrafine soil geochemistry within the Mulga Plum – Jeedamya tenements, situated on the western side of Arika’s Kookynie project area. 

The targets represent basement-sourced gold and multi-element geochemical anomalies indicative of the presence of orogenic gold mineralised systems on E40/350.

In addition, the survey has also defined targets at the Cosmopolitan NW gold prospect, including two priority targets (CTA1 and CTA2).

While these targets remain untested by drilling, upcoming extensional and infill soil sampling will be conducted to refine and prioritise areas ahead of future drill campaigns.

Background on Kookynie

The Mulga Plum-Jeedamya and Cosmopolitan prospects form part of Arika’s 80%-owned Kookynie gold project, 50km south of Leonora and 180km north of Kalgoorlie in the world-class North-Eastern Goldfields mining district of WA.

Like Arika’s (ASX:ARI) Yundamindra asset, the Kookynie Gold Project has significant gold endowment but has seen minimal modern exploration over its ~110km2 tenure.

Initial exploration by ARI from 2019 to 2021 largely focused on the known mineralisation at the McTavish, Leipold and Champion deposits, all on granted mining leases, with more than 30,000m of drilling completed.

Those key prospects all boast shallow mineralisation and are close to multiple gold processing mills easily accessible by road, providing a unique opportunity for the company to unlock significant value.

A recent independent technical review commissioned by the company identified numerous unexplored priority targets and highlighted the potential upside at the project, prompting the launch of an accelerated exploration program.

With a pipeline of both greenfield and legacy targets, the review highlighted a solid foundation for ongoing discovery and resource growth.

Results merit continued exploration

ARI managing director Justin Barton said the company’s soil geochemistry programs across the Kookynie Project have been designed to help refine high priority structural targets.

“The results of this work have delivered very positive results, highlighting multiple high-priority coincident geochemical and geophysical targets for follow-up exploration,” he said.

“Recent surveys at our Mulga Plum-Jeedamya tenements in the western part of the project area have defined two high-priority targets.

“Two promising new gold targets have also been defined at the Cosmopolitan prospect just 2km NW of the historical Cosmopolitan Mine – this could be an extension of the structural corridor hosting the recently discovered McTavish East deposit or a previously unrecognised parallel structure to that which hosts the historical Cosmopolitan deposit.”

What else is happening?

Barton says both areas are largely unexplored, representing exciting prospects for new discoveries. Follow up soil sampling will help Arika prioritise the targets for drilling.

It’s not the only iron the gold explorer has in an increasingly hot fire.

“Meanwhile, we look forward to recommencing drilling at Yundamindra later this week, marking the start of an exciting period of exploration for the company,” Barton said.

Yundamindra, located near major multi-million ounce operations like Sunrise Dam and Granny Smith but shockingly underexplored at depth has already returned results for ARI like 35.76m at 2.14 g/t Au from 104.27m at the Pennyweight Point prospect, with more thick gold hits at Landed at Last and F1-Fault.

Arika shares are up 43% YTD on the back of that success, even with a $5m capital raise taken into account.

Back to Kookynie and further extensional and infill -2mm Soil Sampling (UFF) will be undertaken around the high-priority anomalies outlined at Mulga Plum-Jeedamya, as well as at some lower priority anomaly areas.

If results from infill sampling of the above anomalies are supportive, reconnaissance RC drilling (subject to regulatory approval) and/or electrical geophysics will be planned.

At Cosmopolitan, extensional and infill sampling, particularly at the southern end of the anomaly, is warranted.

If results are supportive, reconnaissance aircore drilling will be undertaken across interpreted NNE-SSW structures once regulatory approvals have been received.

This article was developed in collaboration with Arika Resources, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.

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