Public Company News

88 Energy has inked a licensing agreement with SAExploration that will see the explorer pick up a raft of 3D seismic data from a significant parcel of land at its Icewine East oil project on Alaska’s North Slope. The company says newly acquired surveys stretch from Pantheon Resources’ nearby acreage onto Icewine and covers a number of reservoir units that could host hydrocarbons.

IGO Limited has snapped up an interest in Venus Metals Corporation after acquiring nine million shares in the company and securing an exploration deal at its Bridgetown Greenbushes project in WA’s South West region. After spending $2.07 million at 23c per share, IGO will secure a 5.6 per cent stake in Venus, making it a substantial shareholder. The project takes in Venus’ Greenbushes East lithium project and its Bridgetown East copper-nickel-PGE project.

ASX-listed Okapi Resources has hit the go button on an 11-hole, 1800m diamond drilling campaign at its Sunnyside prospect, part of the larger Enmore gold project in northern NSW. The work is aimed at following up on a suite of “exceptional” hits scored in a maiden drilling campaign at the venture late last year.

Surefire Resources is keen to keep its drill bits spinning as it looks to bring in more rigs across the company’s gold, iron ore and vanadium projects in Western Australia. Having just wrapped up a round of RC drilling and a diamond hole at its gold and vanadium projects, Surefire is now lining up a rig for its iron ore venture.

Cell immunotherapy company Chimeric Therapeutics will launch the first-ever trials of its patented CORE Natural Killer cells with two complementary smart drug therapies — one to stimulate the body’s uptake of the treatment and the other to attack the defence mechanisms of colorectal cancer cells. The trials will be conducted at the UH Seidman Cancer Center in Ohio, USA.

St George Mining has tabled a flurry of exploration results across its WA portfolio, including the sighting of visual copper sulphides at its Paterson copper-gold project. The company has also identified a suite of priority drill targets at its Ajana and Mt Alexander nickel-copper-PGE operations through geophysical surveys.

Metal Hawk’s dominant partner IGO Limited will inject another $4 million into the duo’s Goldfields joint venture nickel operation. The stage 2 earn-in deal will give IGO an additional 24 per cent stake in the partnership. After spending $3 million at stage 1, the latest move will lift IGO’s interest from 51 per cent to 75 per cent.

CZR Resources has been cleared to fast-track drilling after receiving heritage approval that it hopes will lead to a 1.6km expansion of its strike length at the northern extension of its Robe Mesa iron ore project in WA’s Pilbara region. The deposit forms part of CZR’s Yarraloola iron ore project, 120km south-west of Karratha. The company says heritage clearance allows it to drill along strike to the north of Robe Mesa’s current mineral resource.

DiscovEx Resources’ JV partner, Carnaby Resources has added to its exploration target list in Queensland, with recent geophysical work across its Greater Duchess copper-gold project near Mt Isa lighting up two deposit-scale anomalies. The induced polarised hits are inside a 3km corridor between Carnaby’s Nil Desperandum and Lady Fanny discoveries.

Multi-element explorer Askari Metals has turned up 31 gold nuggets using traditional gold loaming at its Horry copper and gold project 90km south-west of Halls Creek, in Western Australia’s Kimberley region. A high-definition magnetic survey was also completed over the project, lighting up multiple structures similar to the source area of gold. The explorer now plans a drilling campaign as soon as possible.

American West Metals is hunting down a suite of exploration targets as part of a maiden drill program at its Storm copper project on Somerset Island in Nunavut, Canada. The campaign could start as early as next month and will focus on its highly prospective zone 2750N that previously delivered a set of solid intercepts, including 110m at 2.45 per cent copper from surface and 3.07 per cent copper from 12.2m.

Grade control drilling results have shown shallow mineralisation continuity at Venus Metals and Rox Resources’ Grace deposit that forms part of the joint venture’s Youanmi gold project near Mount Magnet in WA. The partners say the latest results reconcile well with the area’s resource model and further de-risk the deposit ahead of commercialisation.