North Vancouver, B.C., October 1, 2024 - Lion One Metals Limited (TSX-V: LIO) (OTCQX: LOMLF) (“Lion One” or the “Company”) is pleased to report significant new high-grade gold results from near-mine exploration and infill drilling at the West Zone target west of to the Tuvatu Gold Mine in Fiji. The company is also pleased to report record preliminary Q1 FY2025 gold production at Tuvatu.
Highlights of West Zone exploration and infill drilling:
105.20 g/t Au over 2.1 m (including 248.35 g/t Au over 0.3 m) (TUDDH-636, from 67.8 m depth)
70.07 g/t Au over 2.1 m (including 73.43 g/t Au over 1.2 m) (TUDDH-647, from 144.5 m depth)
102.38 g/t Au over 1.2 m (TUDDH-645, from 97.7 m depth)
19.82 g/t Au over 5.1 m (including 68.88 g/t Au over 0.9 m) (TUDDH-636, from 34.5 m depth)
146.61 g/t Au over 0.6 m (including 289.85 g/t Au over 0.3 m) (TUDDH-645, from 164.3 m depth)
24.16 g/t Au over 3.3 m (including 96.78 g/t Au over 0.3 m) (TUDDH-652, from 173.5 m depth)
49.72 g/t Au over 0.8 m (including 78.61 g/t Au over 0.4 m) (TUDDH-755, from 52.94 m depth)
42.44 g/t Au over 1.8 m (including 61.66 g/t Au over 0.6 m) (TUDDH-636, from 60.6 m depth)
7.68 g/t Au over 4.2 m (including 28.63 g/t Au over 0.3 m) (TUDDH-645, from 142.4 m depth)
14.86 g/t Au over 2.0 m (TUDDH-636, from 228.8 m depth)
*All drill intersects are downhole lengths, 3.0 g/t cutoff. See Table 1 for additional data
Highlights of quarterly gold production (preliminary results):
3,680 oz of gold recovered from July-September 2024
31,390 tonnes milled from July-September 2024
Record quarterly gold production (previous record set in the prior quarter, April-June 2024)
July production impacted by scheduled 9-day mill maintenance shutdown
August production impacted by mining equipment breakdown
Quarterly Production Results
Lion One Metals will produce approximately 3,680 oz of gold during the three-month period ending September 30th, 2024. This is a new quarterly production record, beating the previous production record of 3,551 oz of gold produced in the prior three-month period ending June 30th, 2024. Production during the period was impacted by a scheduled 9-day mill maintenance shutdown in July, as well as by mining equipment breakdowns in August. The total tonnes processed during the three-month period ending September 30th was 31,390 tonnes, which is comparable to the prior three-month period of 32,100 tonnes processed.
The mill shutdown in July was conducted to maintain and upgrade the Tuvatu processing plant facilities, and will have a significant impact on processing efficiency and cost savings moving forward. Major upgrades completed during the shutdown include re-lining the primary ball mill with rubber liners, replacing the bowl/mantle for the cone crusher, replacing the #1 conveyor belt, replacing the grinding and gravity circuit piping with flexible slurry hoses, and installing new detox feed pumps and feed splitter box for the detox circuit.
Re-lining the ball mill with rubber liners is a significant upgrade as the lighter weight rubber liners will reduce power draw by the primary ball mill and will enable a higher ball charge and finer primary grind, thereby improving mill recovery and efficiency. Wear life on the rubber liners is also expected to double from 6 months to 1 year thereby reducing long-term maintenance costs. The grinding and gravity circuit piping replacements will improve mill availability and will further reduce maintenance costs as the use of flexible slurry hoses will result in significantly less downtime for pipe repairs than with the previous steel piping. Overall, the upgrades completed during the July mill shutdown have helped to increase mill availability from 89% in the three-month period ending June 30th, to 93% in the three-month period ending September 30th. The upgrades have also helped to increase average daily mill throughput per operating day (excluding the planned mill shutdown) from 353 TPD in the three-month period ending June 30th to 371 TPD in the three-month period ending September 30th. In addition to the processing plant improvements, operational costs from the filtered tailings haulage have also been reduced by bringing the haulage operation in-house with three new trucks acquired during the quarter, which will lead to significant cost savings from operations.
Gold production during the quarter was also impacted by mine equipment availability in August. Two underground loaders were down for repairs simultaneously. Having both loaders down for repairs significantly impacted mining operations as production material could not be extracted from the mine. Stockpiled low-grade development material was therefore fed through the mill during the interim period while the loaders were repaired, resulting in decreased production in August. A new underground loader from Australia was purchased and arrived on site in September resulting in improved equipment availability and enhanced redundancy. see & read more on
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