Soil Sampling over High Priority Gold Targets

RNS Number : 9901Q

Oriole Resources PLC

02 November 2021

 

Oriole Resources PLC 

('Oriole Resources' or 'the Company' or 'the Group')

Soil Sampling to Commence over High Priority Gold Targets at Central Licence Package, Cameroon

Oriole Resources PLC (AIM: ORR), the AIM-quoted exploration company focussed on West Africa, is pleased to provide an update on its 90%-owned Central Licence Package ('CLP' or the 'Package') in Central Cameroon, where the team is undertaking systematic and cost-effective exploration. The district-scale CLP comprises eight contiguous licences covering 3,592 square kilometres ('km ² ') of Paleo-Proterozoic to Pan-African age rocks that are highly prospective for orogenic-style gold mineralisation. Ranking of an initial 18 targets in the east of the Package has identified five Priority 1 zones for follow-up soil sampling.

Highlights

· Five Priority 1 gold zones identified in the east of the Package.

· Regional-scale (400m by 200m sample spacing) soil grids have been designed to cover these zones to test the footprint of the anomalism.

· Three of the grids are centred over the northeast-trending Tcholliré-Banyo shear zone ('TBSZ'), which the Company believes is a key control on the gold anomalies identified to date.  

· Sampling of an initial Pilot Area is expected to be completed before the end of the year, with gold results anticipated in early Q1.

· Mapping and sampling over the remaining three licences in the west of the CLP will resume in Q4 2021.

Oriole Resources CEO, Tim Livesey, said : "The initial gold results from the five easternmost CLP licences have allowed us to confirm a substantial area of structural complexity, where at least two main trends or corridors of mineralisation are evident, one broadly following the TBSZ and one approximately perpendicular to this, trending northwest.

"The multiple gold anomalies identified within a number of coincident drainage basins associated with these trends, gives us great confidence that this new exploration district has the potential to yield multiple targets along these gold corridors, as we expected following our early prospectivity work in 2019. 

"We are now able to rapidly move the exploration programme forward to further define areas of interest and we look forward to sharing the results from the initial soil sampling and mapping programmes as we head toward the end of the year and into 2022. 

"In addition, we look forward to interpreting the outstanding multi-element data from the five eastern licences and to completing the outstanding stream sediment sampling in the three westernmost licences - all of which should be completed before the end of the year.

"The CLP is definitely starting to show us the potential for multiple gold targets, as we had initially indicated when applying for the ground."

Further Details

In Q1 2021, the Company's 90%-owned Cameroonian subsidiary, Oriole Cameroon SARL, was granted  five new licences (Tenekou, Niambaram, Pokor, Ndom and Mbe) in central  Cameroon, located immediately west of the regional capital, Ngaoundéré (announcement dated 3 February 2021).Together with a further three new licences (Mana, Dogon and Sanga) granted to Reservoir Minerals Cameroon SARL, in which the Company has subsequently earned a 90% interest (announcement dated 6 April 2021), the CLP as a whole covers a contiguous, district-scale land package of 3,592km ² .

Covering Paleo-Proterozoic to Pan-African rocks, a well-known host for orogenic gold deposits worldwide, the CLP licences were initially targeted by the Company's technical team due to their apparent proximity to the dominant regional structure, the TBSZ, a major southwest-northeast-trending splay off the larger-scale Central African Shear Zone. The TBSZ and its associated shears, thrusts and faults are (according to academic literature) thought to be one of the significant structural controls for gold and other mineralisation in the region.

In Q3 2021, the Company completed a first-pass regional mapping and stream sediment sampling over the five easternmost licences that identified 18 initial targets (>30 parts per billion ('ppb') gold ('Au')) and delivered grades of up to 291 ppb Au (announcements dated 19 August 2021 and 6 October 2021). The team has subsequently generated a topographic and hydrological map to enable a detailed review and ranking of those targets.

Five Priority 1 gold zones have been identified for follow-up by semi-regional soil sampling at a spacing of 400m by 200m. In these zones, the team believes there is a high probability that the anomalous samples are directly related to the adjacent major TBSZ-related structures that are outcropping over relative topographic highs. This more direct exploration technique will test structures related to the main TBSZ and aims to outline broad gold-in-soil anomalies that will help guide more targeted programmes in 2022. Maps showing results of the ranking and the planned soil sampling grids can be viewed at the following link: http://www.rns-pdf.londonstockexchange.com/rns/9901Q_1-2021-11-1.pdf

The first grid will be completed over a Pilot Area that covers the east of the Ndom and Mbe permits and the core of this zone, which ranked the highest overall, will also include a higher resolution sampling grid of 400m by 100m. Sampling of the Pilot Area is expected to be completed before the end of the year, with initial gold results expected in early Q1 2022. Sampling over the remaining grids will continue into early 2022, and further testing over Priority 2 gold zones will be subject to ongoing results. 

At Pokor, the sources of the gold-in-stream anomalies are not so well defined and so the team is planning to undertake infill stream sediment sampling to better-constrain the source.  

At the three westernmost licences, the team will shortly undertake a reconnaissance visit to assess the ground conditions and it is anticipated that the stream sediment sampling programme will commence later in Q4-2021.

For further information on the Central Licence Package, please see  the following page of the Company's website   https://orioleresources.com/projects/central-cameroon/ .

Competent Persons Statement  

The information in this release that relates to Exploration Results has been compiled by Claire Bay (Executive Director, Exploration & Business Development). Claire Bay (MGeol, CGeol) is a Competent Person as defined in the JORC code and takes responsibility for the release of this information. Claire has reviewed the information in this announcement and confirms that she is not aware of any new information or data that materially affects the information reproduced here.

The information contained within this announcement is deemed to constitute inside information as stipulated under the retained EU law version of the Market Abuse Regulation (EU) No. 596/2014 (the "UK MAR") which is part of UK law by virtue of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018. The information is disclosed in accordance with the Company's obligations under Article 17 of the UK MAR. Upon the publication of this announcement, this inside information is now considered to be in the public domain.  

** ENDS **

For further information please visit   www.orioleresources.com ,   @OrioleResources  on Twitter, or contact:

Oriole Resources PLC Bob Smeeton / Tim Livesey / Claire Bay	Tel: [phone]
Blytheweigh (IR/PR contact) Tim Blythe / Megan Ray / Rachael Brooks	Tel: [phone]
Grant Thornton UK LLP Samantha Harrison / George Grainger	Tel: [phone]
Shard Capital Partners LLP Damon Heath / Erik Woolgar / Isabella Pierre	Tel: [phone]

Notes to Editors:

Oriole Resources PLC is an AIM-listed exploration company, operating West Africa. It is focused on early-stage exploration in Cameroon (Bibemi, Wapouzé and Central Licence Package projects) and the more advanced Senala gold project in Senegal, where IAMGOLD has the option to spend US$8 million to earn a 70% interest. The Company also has several interests and royalties in companies operating throughout Africa and Turkey that could deliver future cash flow, and it continues to assess new opportunities in both regions.

 

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