LONDON (ShareCast) - (Sharecast News) - Strategic Minerals confirmed the arrival of a diamond core drill rig at its Redmoor tungsten-tin-copper project in east Cornwall on Tuesday, with drilling expected to start within days as part of a fully funded exploration programme.
The AIM-traded firm said the rig, operated by Priority Drilling UK, would begin the first three boreholes at Redmoor, ahead of the arrival of a second rig to complete a nine-hole, 5,300-metre campaign.

It said the programme was the major component of a UK government-supported initiative under the UK Shared Prosperity Fund, with 50% of drilling costs to be reimbursed.

The new drilling, combined with relogging and sampling of historic 2017 drillcore, would feed into an updated JORC 2012 mineral resource estimate (MRE) scheduled for completion in the first quarter of 2026.

Strategic said the current MRE, last updated in 2019, stood at 11.7 million tonnes at a tin equivalent grade of 1.17%, including 0.56% tungsten trioxide, 0.16% tin, and 0.50% copper.

At the same time, Cornwall Resources (CRL) - a wholly-owned subsidiary of Strategic Minerals - was progressing with the relogging and sampling of drillcore from earlier campaigns.

Three additional holes totalling 1,072.5 metres had recently been re-logged, with 83 samples currently undergoing analysis at ALS Laboratories in Loughrea.

A further 5,949.6 metres of historic core was still to be processed.

CRL was also awaiting assay results from 328 soil samples taken from the wider Tamar Valley licence area surrounding Redmoor.

Those were expected to support further target generation and enhance understanding of regional mineralisation.

"With the drill rig on site at Redmoor and setup underway, we expect to be drilling within a matter of days," said Dennis Rowland, project manager at CRL.

"This programme, alongside the relogging and sampling of historic CRL drillcore, is designed to further strengthen our geological dataset prior to a mineral resource estimate update of the Redmoor tungsten-tin-copper deposit.

"With renewed significant expenditure and an expanded team, CRL can deploy multiple workflows designed to grow the story in Cornwall and progress our critical minerals project within the highly prospective Tamar Valley."

At 1240 BST, shares in Strategic Minerals were down 2.34% at 0.29p.

Reporting by Josh White for Sharecast.com.

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