Brightstar’s Second Fortune extensional drilling hits high-grade gold

Infill and extensional drilling has confirmed the consistency of the narrow-vein, high-grade gold at Brightstar Resources’ Second Fortune mine

Brightstar Resources’ high-grade gold intercepts bodes well for Second Fortune resources as ore haulage to Genesis’ Laverton Mill continues. Pic: Getty Images

• Brightstar Resources’ infill and extensional drilling intersects more high-grade gold at Second Fortune

• Results illustrate consistency of narrow-vein, high-grade gold at underground mine

• Updated resource and progress on ore processing under the OPA expected in March 2025

Special Report: Soon to be producing gold again, Brightstar Resources has proven there’s more to be found at its Second Fortune mine after infill and extensional drilling returned narrow-vein, high-grade gold hits.

Results such as 1.16m grading 30.36g/t gold from a down-hole depth of 101.6m and 2.05m at 13.85g/t from 97.75m were returned from the underground drilling, which was designed to provide geological information for mine planning, scheduling and a resource update due in H1 2025.

Importantly, they confirmed that narrow-vein, high-grade intercepts are present in multiple parallel mineralised veins typical of the Second Fortune ore body, which remains open at depth, while reinforcing its strong geological consistency.

This bodes well for future mining at Second Fortune as Brightstar Resources’ (ASX:BTR) current mine plan is only limited by drilling.

Second Fortune showing development with drillhole traces. Pic: Brightstar Resources

Ore haulage of existing high-grade Second Fortune stockpiles is progressing well with material already awaiting processing at Genesis Minerals’ (ASX:GMD) Laverton mill in March 2025 under the ore purchase agreement between the two companies.

Up to 500,000t of ore will be processed under the OPA over the course of 2025 and Q1 2026 at the Laverton Mill.

This will include further ore from Second Fortune, historical stockpiles from the Lord Byron open pit at Jasper Hills and – subject to final regulatory approvals – development of the Fish underground project.

Cash flow from the OPA will help fuel the company’s expansion plans.

They include aggressive exploration in parallel with the anticipated release of its definitive feasibility study for the wider Laverton-Menzies development, and the refurbishment of its own processing plant near Laverton.

The prospect of production and cash flow under the OPA looks to be well-timed. Gold prices hit a new all time high of US$2874.65/oz on Friday.

Last week Lion Selection Group chief executive officer Hedley Widdup, a respected watcher of the Australian gold space, told Stockhead mining guru Josh Chiat that the current gold price trend is “not a flash in the pan” in the wake of World Gold Council figures that showed physical demand hit a record high in 2024.

“You get all sorts of volatility in the gold market, but I think this is a harbinger of it being something which should have more than just a short term turnaround to it,” he said.

Effective mine planning

“The latest round of underground diamond drilling has continued to illustrate the consistency of the narrow-vein, high-grade gold at Second Fortune,” BTR managing director Alex Rovira said.

“The underground drilling program was designed to infill certain areas to increase confidence in the upcoming resource update, whilst also drilling extensional holes at the edges of the known orebody and the extents of the current mine plan.

“These results provide the platform for effective mine planning at Second Fortune, which is currently providing high-grade material for processing through our ore purchase agreement with Genesis Minerals.

“Brightstar is continuing to add value across all the project areas and development pipeline, with a large on-going surface RC exploration drilling continuing at Sandstone whilst the DFS for our Menzies and Laverton operations advances towards completion.”

Second Fortune sits at the southern end of the Laverton Tectonic Zone which lies on the eastern margin of the Norseman-Wiluna Belt.

It consists of a main lode and a number of subsidiary lodes such as the hanging wall and footwall lodes that are ~10m from the main lode and the Caturra Lode to the west.

BTR expects to update key milestones relating to Second Fortune – including ore processing under the OPA resulting in the first gold pour of 2025 – to the market in March.This will be accompanied by an updated resource for the Second Fortune mine and the company’s other deposits across the Laverton, Sandstone and Menzies gold hubs.

Technical work is also continuing on the DFS for Menzies and Laverton as well as near-term development of mining operations at the Jasper Hills project.

This article was developed in collaboration with Brightstar Resources, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.

This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.