Greatland Gold plc has announced that drilling has commenced at the Meadows gold prospect within the Ernest Giles Project in Western Australia. The project is located within the underexplored Archean greenstone belt of the highly mineralized Yilgarn Craton. The drilling program will test interpreted mineralized zones and is co-funded by the Government of Western Australia's Exploration Incentive Scheme (EIS) drilling grant. The drilling will provide important geological and structural information to inform a systematic reverse circulation drill program in 2024. Greatland Gold's Managing Director, Shaun Day, stated that the Ernest Giles Project represents an excellent exploration opportunity for the company and its shareholders.
The Ernest Giles Project is located approximately 250km northeast of Laverton and covers a folded belt of magnetic greenstone rocks. The project is considered to be part of the highly gold and nickel endowed parts of the Archean Goldfields of Western Australia. The greenstone sequence at Ernest Giles is underexplored compared to other parts of the Goldfields. Greatland Gold holds a comprehensive tenure over the most prospective near-surface portions of the Ernest Giles belt, covering more than 1,950km2.
The current drilling program builds on previous exploration work at Ernest Giles, which included vertical RC drillholes, airborne magnetics, and ground gravity surveys. Gold mineralization and anomalism have been observed within altered mafic volcanic, banded iron formation (BIF), and syenite. The two co-funded diamond core drill holes will target mineralized zones within the previous RC holes and provide important geological understanding of the project.
Further work at Ernest Giles will include airborne geophysics to better understand the geology of the entire belt. A follow-up RC drilling program will be designed based on the knowledge gained from the current drilling to systematically target the best results at Meadows. This work is expected to commence in 2024.