Aim-listed Oriole Resources expects a Boart Longyear drill rig to arrive at its Bibemi project site in Cameroon, by early December, which will enable the company to start its 3 000 m diamond drilling programme before the end of the year.
Additionally, ancillary equipment is en route from South Africa and is also due to arrive soon.
Meanwhile, the company says the construction of a drill camp is well under way, with 17 drill holes already having been identified within the high-grade Bakassi area.
“We are confident that Bibemi will continue building on the good results we have already yielded from the rock chip sampling and trenching programme, and it will be great to get some vertical extension to the significant trends that the team have already identified on surface,” says CEO Tim Livesey.
Oriole, under the terms of an option agreement with Bureau d’Etudes et d’Investigations Géologico-minières, is earning up to a 90% interest in the Bibemi and Wapouzé projects in northern Cameroon by spending $3.12-million over four years.
Oriole is currently in the third year of that investment period.
The company in September signed a diamond drilling contract with London-listed Capital Drilling to conduct drilling on site, which will focus particularly on stacked veins recently identified at the northern end of the 5.3-km-long Zone 1 target.
Earlier sampling by the company had returned grades of 35.86 g/t gold and a best trenching intersection of 9 m grading 3.24 g/t gold.