American Tungsten & Antimony (ASX: AT4) confirms early scale at Antimony Canyon

Early drilling at the Antimony Canyon Project in Utah has delivered the first modern confirmation that high grade antimony extends beyond historic workings at the Little Emma area. Initial assays from the company’s first drilling campaign intersected mineralisation in four of the first seven holes and included shallow intercepts such as 11.03 m at 3.1% Sb and 8.47 m at 2.67% Sb.

These early results provide practical validation that the geological model developed from historic mining information, surface work and geophysical data can be successfully tested through modern drilling and that the system remains open to further exploration.

American Tungsten & Antimony Managing Director Andre Booyzen spoke with MarketOpen to answer key investor questions following the announcement, outlining what the initial drilling results confirm about the project, how they support the company’s exploration framework and how the next phase of work will focus on expanding the system across the broader Antimony Canyon district.

What have the first drill holes confirmed about the scale and continuity of the Antimony Canyon system?

The initial drilling program confirms that high grade antimony occurs beyond the historic workings and that the system we expected to encounter can be identified through modern exploration, with mineralisation intersected in four of the first seven holes providing early evidence that the project hosts a coherent system rather than isolated historic occurrences.

For us, the practical outcome is that the geological framework we have been working with is now supported by drilling, which reduces the uncertainty that often exists in projects where historic mining activity has not previously been tested with modern exploration.

While these results do not yet establish the full scale of the system and further drilling will be required to understand how far it extends, they demonstrate that the exploration approach we are taking is working and that the project warrants continued systematic testing.

Several intercepts appear to exceed the assumptions underpinning the Exploration Target. How does this influence your confidence in the 6.1 to 6.9 Mt at 1.4 to 2.3% Sb framework?

The Exploration Target was established using historic mining information together with surface work and geophysical data, so the role of the first drilling program is to begin testing whether those assumptions hold when examined through modern drilling.

The early results provide encouraging support for that framework, several intersections return grades and widths that locally exceed the assumptions used in the conceptual range, which gives us greater confidence that the exploration model underpinning the target is valid.

It is important to emphasise that the Exploration Target remains conceptual and that additional drilling is required before a Mineral Resource can be defined.

What these results do is reduce the uncertainty around the geological interpretation and provide a clear basis for continuing to test the system through further drilling.

Mineralisation was intersected in four of the first seven holes. What does that early hit rate indicate about system continuity?

An early hit rate like that gives us confidence that the system we are targeting is present across the area we are testing rather than being limited to a single historic working.

The purpose of the first phase of drilling is to determine whether the mineralised horizon continues beyond the areas that were historically mined and the results show that it does.

From a project perspective this is important because it supports the idea that the system can be explored in a structured way rather than relying on isolated historic pits.

It also helps guide the placement of future drill holes because we now have confirmation that the mineralisation we are targeting can be intersected where the geological framework suggests it should occur.

What the results do not yet prove is the ultimate scale of the system, that is something only continued drilling will determine, but the early outcomes give us confidence that the exploration strategy we are pursuing is appropriate.

With geophysics and additional drilling planned, what are the immediate priorities to expand the mineralised footprint at Antimony Canyon?

Our immediate focus is to use the information generated from the first phase of drilling to guide the next stage of exploration across the broader project area, with the initial results helping refine our understanding of where the system sits and how it may extend beyond the areas drilled so far.

The next step is to run modern geophysical surveys around the areas where drilling has already identified high grade mineralisation, with those surveys designed to highlight additional areas that may represent extensions of the system, particularly where the prospective horizon is not exposed at surface.

At the same time, we are preparing additional drilling programs across other parts of the project area that align with the structural framework identified through earlier work, with the objective of progressively testing the broader system and determining whether the mineralised footprint extends across the wider Antimony Canyon district.

Next phase shifts focus to scale

The first phase of drilling at Antimony Canyon represents an important step in moving the project from historic interpretation to modern exploration, with the work completed to date providing practical validation that the geological model can be tested successfully through drilling even though it does not yet define the full scale of the system.

With further geophysical work and additional drilling programs planned, the company is now focused on systematically expanding its understanding of the system across the broader project area, and for investors the next phase of exploration will be important in determining how the project develops and whether the emerging geological framework translates into a larger opportunity over time.

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