The company emerged from a trading halt to announce that it had made an “extremely” high-grade gold discovery at the project, 40km out of Leinster.
Drilling of the Tribune lode intersected 5 at 37.5 grams per tonne gold, within a broader zone of 7m at 27.4gpt gold from 92m.
A step-out hole drilled 80m to the south hit 7m of quartz, sulphides and visible gold from 18m, but assays are pending.
The structure is open to the south and at depth.
Mineralisation appears to be similar in style and nature to the historically mined Bellevue lode, which produced 800,000 ounces of gold at 15gpt gold.
The nearest step-out holes are 1.1km to the south in the Western Mineralised Corridor, which is a priority area for Draig given historical hits of 4.45m at 22.87gpt and 1.85m at 25.88gpt.
The area is considered relatively untested and sits under shallow transported sand cover.
Draig executive director Steve Parsons said the company’s technical team was extremely excited by the result.
“This drill result has demonstrated the potential for Bellevue-style ore ‘shoots’ on the adjacent parallel Tribune lode structure within the Western Mineralised Corridor and validated the exploration team’s belief that the potential for repeat and offset structures capable of hosting a significant orebody similar in size and grade of the historic Bellevue mine is very high,” he said.
Follow-up drilling is already underway along with down-hole electromagnetics and geological mapping.
Draig, a former Mongolia-focused coal explorer, acquired Bellevue mine late last year, with Parsons, the former managing director of Gryphon Minerals, getting on board in late March.
The narrow-vein operation ran for over 100 years until 1997.
The company has described Bellevue as a “forgotten treasure” given that it hasn’t been explored in about 20 years, missing the benefits of modern techniques.
Draig had $657,000 at the end of September, but raised $2.61 million before costs last month by issuing shares at 5c apiece.
Former Syrah Resources managing director, resource sector entrepreneur Tolga Kumova, came onboard last month as a 9.2% shareholder.
After peaking at 24c this morning, Draig shares were last trading 83% higher at 22c.
