Rigs get running in hunt for gold to get Brightstar Mill shining again

Brightstar Resources is on the hunt for new gold resources to back its plan to bring its Brightstar Mill back to life, launching a new drilling program at the Delta 2 and Cork Tree Well prospects.

Eight holes have already been drilled by contractors Blue Spec Drilling at the Delta 2 prospect, where historic aircore drilling outlined an aircore anomaly with a massive strike length of more than 500m at over 1g/t gold.

1158m of a planned 1790m have been drilled into the bedrock beneath the anomaly which has never been drill tested before.

The RC rig will then move to Cork Tree Well, where Brightstar Resources (ASX:BTR) already boasts an impressive JORC resource of 3.9Mt at 1.9g/t for 237,000oz.

Blue Spec will complete an expansive 50 hole program for 7350m looking for splay and parallel lodes identified in a previous program north of the historic pits, extending drilling along strike to the north of the main Cork Tree Well deposit.

That should provide even more data to build on the existing resource at Cork Tree Well, with an updated JORC 2012 estimate for the Cork Tree Well system already on the way along with assays from a 2000m aircore program at Brightstar South.

“We look forward to growing the current resource at Cork Tree Well main lode with this program as well as the discovery of new opportunities in the project area,” Brightstar MD Bill Hobba says.

“Ideally this will allow Brightstar to develop multiple mining scenarios to feed the Brightstar Mill, which is currently on care and maintenance.”

Brightstar brings in the big guns

Meanwhile, Brightstar is leaving no stone unturned in its search for gold at its Laverton gold holdings, and a new appointment is set to ramp up exploration activity at its Comet Well Project, where 17 prospective targets have already been outlined immediately next to Brightstar’s 207,000oz Alpha and Beta resources.

Former WMC geologist Dr Nigel Brand has come on board as the geochemical and targeting consultant for Comet Well.

Brand worked with WMC Resources for eleven years until 1999 throughout the Norseman-Wiluna Greenstone belt on regional nickel and gold exploration programs and at WMC operations at Norseman, Kambalda, Kalgoorlie, Leinster and Mt Keith.

He also worked for global major Anglo American as a geochemist in its Asia Pacific region exploration programs across India, the Philippines and Australia before becoming an active consultant in exploration geochemistry from 2004.

Dr Brand will undertake an extensive review of geochemical data from both surface and downhole within the Comet Well project area and to help plan new exploration programs to advance successful discoveries in the prospective area.

This article was developed in collaboration with Brightstar 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.