PERTH (miningweekly.com) – Following a successful merger with fellow-listed Excelsior Gold earlier this year, Spitfire Materials has now reported a Joint Ore Reserves Committee- (Jorc-) compliant mineral resource estimate of 2.6-million ounces for the consolidated Bardoc gold project, in Western Australia.

Spitfire on Tuesday told shareholders that the updated resource estimate incorporated the 1.56-million ounce Jorc resource for the Aphrodite deposit that was completed as part of exploration and technical studies undertaken during 2018.

Since January 2018, an additional 12 319 m of drilling has been completed over both the Alpha and Phi deposits that make up the Aphrodite resource.

The new resource estimate also included a maiden Jorc mineral resource for the satellite Mulwarrie deposit and an increased underground resource for the Zoroastrian deposit.

“The completion of a consolidated Jorc Mineral Resource statement for the Bardoc project represented a major step towards its objective of becoming a substantial new participant in the midtier Australian gold sector,” said Spitfire MD John Young.

“This is a fantastic result for our shareholders. This is now one of the largest consolidated gold resource inventories in the Eastern Goldfields, and it gives us the critical mass to move forward on our planned growth path, which is based on developing an integrated processing hub at Bardoc,” he said.

This new mineral resource will form part the of Spitfire’s ongoing technical studies and potential future definitive feasibility studies on the combined Bardoc project.

“Our vision is to build a new processing centre capable of processing a wide range of ore types. We see the opportunity to establish a sizeable production hub based on the three key deposits of Aphrodite, Zoroastrian and Mulwarrie, potentially fed by additional incremental growth opportunities in the region,” Young said.