SNX opens five-rig search for a larger As Safra copper-gold system

Five-Rig Campaign Targets As Safra Scale

Sierra Nevada Gold Limited (ASX:SNX) is moving into the most intensive exploration phase yet at its 100%-owned As Safra Copper-Gold Project, with a 25,000m drilling campaign designed to test whether the Saudi Arabian system can support both a maiden Mineral Resource pathway and a larger district-scale discovery story.

Mobilisation is under way, with two diamond rigs and one reverse-circulation rig targeted to be operating by 30 September 2026. A third diamond rig is expected in late October and a fourth in mid-November, progressively taking the campaign to five rigs. Drilling is expected to continue through March 2027, while first assay results are anticipated in November.

Central Copper Receives 8,000m Resource Focus

The most defined part of the program is an 8,000m campaign at the more than 800m-long Central Copper Zone. SNX will use the drilling to test the geometry, continuity and grade distribution of copper mineralisation, as well as the drill density required to assess a potential maiden resource.

Phase 1 intersections cited by the company include 16m at 1.49% copper from 160m in hole ASDD0009, including 3m at 3.62% copper and 2m at 4.95% copper, alongside 9m at 1.83% copper from 99m in ASDD0012. These are exploration results rather than a resource estimate, and the new drilling will need to demonstrate continuity beyond individual intercepts.

Expansion Drilling Reaches Beyond Known Zones

A further 7,000m will test extensions to known mineralisation, including the more than 3km copper trend north-north-east of Central Copper and strike and depth extensions at the As Safra Southeast copper system. The program will also follow up an Au-Ag-Cu-Pb-Zn polymetallic breccia discovery that returned 11m at 1.15 grams per tonne gold, 108.7 grams per tonne silver, 0.21% copper, 4.64% zinc and 1.88% lead from 49m.

10,000m Reserved for New Discoveries

SNX has allocated 10,000m to previously undrilled magnetic, gravity and induced-polarisation anomalies, concealed mineralised systems and priority gold targets. Drilling will be supported by about 13.5km of trenching, geological mapping and systematic geochemical sampling across the broader prospective corridor, which extends for more than 12km.

That discovery component gives the campaign a wider ambition than simply converting the Central Copper results into a resource candidate. The company says the work will test whether the known mineralised centres form part of a larger, multi-centre hydrothermal system, although the announcement provides no resource estimate, economic study or guarantee that the targets will produce further discoveries.

November Assays Set the First Test

SNX says it will integrate drilling, trenching, geological, geochemical and geophysical results as the campaign progresses, allowing priorities to change as new information emerges. The first meaningful checkpoint is therefore not the headline metre count but whether November assays establish repeatable copper grades and continuity at Central, while also showing that the broader targets can add substance beyond the initial discovery footprint.