Europa Metals reports that a diamond drilling rig has been mobilised to its Toral lead-zinc-silver project in Leόn, northern Spain, as the London-listed company looks to commence a new exploration campaign in the next week.

The rig and associated operating crew is being supplied by Sondeos y Perforaciones Industriales de Bierzo SA and will be overseen by Europa’s on-site exploration team, the company said. The campaign will be conducted using a single drilling rig with assays sent for independent analysis on a rolling basis.

Addison Mining Services Limited (AMS) has been retained to carry out a revised independent resource update in accordance with JORC guidelines once the campaign has been concluded, Europa said, with Wardell Armstrong engaged to conduct the metallurgical test work from a representative sample taken from the drilling.

The core objectives of the drilling campaign are to drill into the high-grade core of the project, as defined within the existing inferred JORC resource (16 Mt at 7% zinc-equivalent); target high-grade areas within the defined resource to further the company’s understanding of the project – the aim being to increase confidence in the resource estimate and attain the indicated resource category – and; obtain a significant sample for the metallurgical test work to determine the potential zinc, lead and silver concentrate composition from Toral.

Laurence Read, Executive Director of Europa Metals, said: “Over the next two quarters, we are expecting to announce the results from the drilling, an updated JORC resource, and details of the likely product types that can be produced from Toral. Taken together, we believe that these key milestones will allow us to advance the processing design and commence discussions with potential offtakers.”