Bellevue Gold (ASX: BGL) has successfully completed its first phase of infill drilling at its high-grade Bellevue Gold Project in Western Australia.
The company remains on track to publish a maiden Indicated Resource in the June quarter of 2020.
Bellevue currently has an Inferred Resource of 2.2 million ounces at 11.3 g/t gold and the infill drilling programme was designed to upgrade the shallow resource areas and selected deeper lodes to the Indicated category.
A total of 94,000 metres of infill drilling has now been completed, with drilling undertaken on a 40m x 20m and a 40m x 40m infill grid.
Bellevue Managing Director Steve Parsons said the infill drilling undertaken to date has typically supported the existing Inferred Resource model and defined the higher-grade shoots within the lode positions, analogous to the historic Bellevue mine.
He said the upgraded Indicated Resource will enable Bellevue to start economic studies and will be supplemented by subsequent infill drilling in other areas.
High-grade mineralisation at Bellevue runs from surface and there is potential to establish multiple open pits which would lead into underground development.
Mr Parsons said desktop studies highlight the potential for open pits at Bellevue and Tribune and these are likely to form part of the project’s economic study. Further shallow drilling is being planned to support this across the Bellevue hanging wall and associated lodes.
He said the completion of the infill drilling programme marked another milestone along the path to project development.
With this key drilling programme now completed, we can move to finalising a maiden Indicated Resource, which will in turn underpin economic studies,” Mr Parsons said.
“The infill drilling has demonstrated the excellent continuity of gold mineralisation as well as robust grades and widths.
“Now we have completed the first phase of infill drilling ready for the maiden Indicated Resource, two rigs will remain on site, one focused on resource growth and one on further indicated drilling.
“We are also continuing with step-out drilling with the aim of growing the global resource at Bellevue and we plan to drill two highly promising conductors identified recently at the Deacon lode.”
Results are currently pending for around 15,700 metres of drilling including a number of significant visual intersections from the Viago lode.
