Scorpion Minerals Reveals 3M Tonne Gold Exploration Target at Pharos

Scorpion Minerals finds promising gold exploration target at Pharos Gold Project in Australia.
By William Hadrian -
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Scorpion Minerals Reveals Major Exploration Target at Old Prospect — Up to 3 Million Tonnes of Gold Mineralisation in Sight

Scorpion Minerals Limited (ASX: SCN) has delivered a significant milestone for its flagship Pharos Gold Project in the Murchison region of Western Australia, announcing a new Exploration Target for the Old Prospect Zone that points to meaningful scale and continuity of gold mineralisation. The Scorpion Minerals Old Prospect gold exploration target at Pharos Gold Project marks a clear step-change in how investors should be thinking about SCN's asset base.

A New Exploration Target That Commands Attention

The newly defined Exploration Target for Old Prospect stands at 1.0 – 3.0 million tonnes grading 1.5 – 2.0 g/t Au.

To put that in context, at the midpoint of both ranges — 2.0 million tonnes at 1.75 g/t Au — that implies a conceptual in-situ gold inventory well in excess of 100,000 ounces. While this is a conceptual target and not a Mineral Resource, it provides a powerful reference point for understanding the growth potential that lies ahead of the existing resource base.

The target covers oxide, transitional and sulphide mineralisation within a steep west-dipping, north-plunging zone with approximately 700 metres of strike extent at surface, modelled to a depth of 170 metres below surface (mbs).

CEO Michael Fotios commented: "Scorpion continues to demonstrate the scale and quality of its expansive asset portfolio in the Murchison region of Western Australia. Our initial Exploration Target for Old Prospect builds on an existing resource base that we will aim to further grow over the coming months."

The Foundation: An Existing Resource Already in Place

The Scorpion Minerals Old Prospect gold exploration target at Pharos Gold Project is not built on wishful thinking. Furthermore, it sits on top of a JORC 2012-compliant Mineral Resource already defined at Old Prospect North and South combined:

Category Tonnes Grade (g/t Au) Contained Au (oz)
Indicated 229,308 2.12 15,599
Inferred 82,871 2.27 6,036
Total 312,395 2.15 21,632

A notable confidence point: 72% of the contained ounces — or 15,600 oz — sit in the higher-confidence Indicated Resource category. That is an unusually high proportion for a project at this stage of development and signals meaningful geological confidence in the mineralisation.

The Exploration Target builds beyond the existing resource boundary, both along strike to the north and south, and down dip and plunge at depth — all areas where drilling has either been absent or too widely spaced to define resources to date.

What the Drilling Has Already Told Us

The Scorpion Minerals Old Prospect gold exploration target at Pharos Gold Project is underpinned by extensive historical and recent drilling campaigns, including:

  • 61 Reverse Circulation (RC) drill holes completed for 5,021 metres
  • 4 Diamond drillholes (DDH) for 922 metres
  • 4,732 RC assay results and 390 DDH assay results
  • Full 3D wireframing and geological modelling of the mineralised zones

The multi-metre intercepts from those campaigns confirm high-grade shoots that validate the geological model and reinforce the potential of the system. Highlights include:

Hole ID Interval (m) From (m) Grade (g/t Au) Notable Subinterval
BWRC006 8m 41m 8.78 2m @ 30.8 g/t Au
BWRC020 8m 9m 7.98 1m @ 32.4 and 1m @ 19.9 g/t Au
21MRRC011 7m 81m 9.10 1m @ 56.1 g/t Au
21MRRC003 15m 45m 2.51
JBD001 19m 114m 1.72 1m @ 21.1 g/t Au
21MRRC032 8m 46m 3.97 1m @ 20.2 g/t Au

Mineralisation at Old Prospect varies in width from 5 to 15 metres, dipping steeply to the west at approximately 80 degrees and plunging north at approximately 80 degrees. Crucially, it remains open north-south along strike and at depth — the very areas that the next drilling campaign has been designed to target.

Understanding Exploration Targets: What This Means for Investors

What Is an Exploration Target?

An Exploration Target is a range of tonnage and grade that a company's geologists believe may exist within a defined area, based on existing geological data, modelling, and drilling — but where insufficient work has been completed to classify it as a formal Mineral Resource under the JORC Code.

It is a forward-looking, conceptual estimate. The JORC Code requires companies to clearly state that the potential quantity and grade is conceptual in nature and that there is no certainty further exploration will result in a Mineral Resource estimate. Scorpion has done this appropriately in its announcement.

Why Does It Matter to Investors?

Exploration Targets serve as a signpost for the scale of what a company is chasing. When set alongside an existing Mineral Resource — as is the case here — they help investors understand the gap between what has already been defined and what the geology suggests might be achievable with additional drilling.

In SCN's case, the Exploration Target sits between 5x and 14x the tonnage of the existing resource, giving a tangible sense of the upside being tested.

Glossary of Key Terms

  • JORC 2012: The Australasian Code for Reporting of Exploration Results, Mineral Resources and Ore Reserves — the industry standard for resource reporting in Australia.
  • Indicated Resource: Mineral Resource with sufficient drilling confidence to support mine planning studies.
  • Inferred Resource: Mineral Resource with lower confidence, based on wider drill spacing.
  • RC Drilling: Reverse Circulation drilling — a cost-effective method producing rock chip samples for assay.
  • DDH (Diamond Drillhole): Diamond core drilling providing continuous samples for detailed geological and metallurgical analysis.
  • g/t Au: Grams of gold per tonne — the standard measure of gold grade.
  • Strike: The horizontal length of a mineralised zone at surface.

The Broader Pharos Picture: A Multi-Commodity Powerhouse

Old Prospect is one component of Scorpion's much larger Pharos Project footprint. The Company holds approximately 900 square kilometres of granted tenure in the Murchison Mineral Field, located roughly 50 kilometres northwest of Cue.

Old Prospect sits within a 5-kilometre-long zone of mineralisation extending from Cap Lamp to Middle Bore — a corridor that remains largely open along strike to the north and south. Scorpion has described itself as holding the largest landholding along the Dalgaranga–Big Bell shear corridor, a regionally significant structural feature that hosts multiple historical gold deposits in the region.

Beyond gold, the Pharos Project also contains the Mt Mulcahy copper deposit, which hosts its own JORC 2012 Mineral Resource:

Resource Category Tonnes Cu (%) Zn (%) Co (%) Ag (g/t)
Measured 193,000 3.0 2.3 0.1 25
Indicated 372,000 2.2 1.7 0.1 19
Inferred 82,000 1.5 1.3 0.1 13
Total 647,000 2.4 1.8 0.1 20

This multi-commodity profile across a large and prospective land package adds meaningful optionality to the Scorpion investment case.

A Processing Path Is Already Being Explored

One of the more strategically important elements of this announcement is the ongoing MOU with Gylden Resources Pty Ltd, which is progressing toward formal agreements regarding mine development and processing at the Kirkalocka plant.

This matters because processing infrastructure in remote Western Australia is a genuine constraint for small gold developers. Access to an established plant could meaningfully reduce the capital intensity of bringing Old Prospect into production.

Scorpion's CEO explicitly connected the Old Prospect work programme to this processing optionality. While the formal agreements have not yet been executed, the progression of these discussions adds a near-term commercial layer to the exploration story.

What Comes Next: A Well-Defined Work Programme

Scorpion has not simply defined the target and moved on. In addition, a structured, multi-pronged exploration programme has been designed and is ready to execute:

  1. Infill and extension RC drilling at Old Prospect — targeting the 700-metre strike zone to tighten drill spacing and support resource upgrades
  2. Diamond drilling down plunge at depth — to test the open mineralisation below the current resource and collect material for geotechnical and metallurgical assessment
  3. Updated pit optimisation — to refine the economics of the existing resource
  4. Mining studies and mining lease conversion — advancing the tenement status of the Old Prospect ground
  5. Follow-up RC drilling of regional targets — approximately 1,500 metres across the broader corridor
  6. Detailed geological mapping at 1:5,000 scale — improving the structural framework
  7. 50-metre line-spaced Airborne Magnetic Survey — a key tool for identifying concealed structures and new targets
  8. Detailed lithostructural interpretation — integrating mapping and geophysics to prioritise drill targets

The combination of infill drilling to grow the existing resource and step-out drilling to test the full extent of the Exploration Target makes the upcoming campaign a genuine de-risking and value-creation exercise.

Why Scorpion Minerals Deserves a Place on Your Watchlist

Several attributes set Scorpion apart from peers at a comparable stage of development:

  • Scale of landholding: ~900 km² in the Murchison, including the largest position along the Dalgaranga–Big Bell shear corridor — a structurally significant and historically productive gold corridor
  • Defined resource with high-confidence classification: 72% of Old Prospect's ounces sit in the Indicated category, a strong foundation for mine planning
  • Clear Exploration Target upside: The 1.0 – 3.0 Mt Exploration Target signals the potential for the resource to grow substantially with drilling
  • High-grade drill intersections: Multiple intercepts in excess of 7–8 g/t over 7–8 metre intervals, with individual metres reaching 56 g/t Au, confirm genuine high-grade shoots within the system
  • Open mineralisation: The deposit remains open along strike and at depth — the follow-up campaign is designed to test exactly these extensions
  • Processing optionality: The Gylden MOU introduces a potential path to plant access that could simplify the development case
  • Multi-commodity asset base: The Mt Mulcahy copper-zinc resource adds further portfolio depth

The Scorpion Minerals Old Prospect gold exploration target at Pharos Gold Project has positioned itself as a serious explorer in one of Western Australia's most enduring gold provinces, with a newly defined Exploration Target of 1.0 – 3.0 million tonnes grading 1.5 – 2.0 g/t Au setting the ambition for what the Old Prospect Zone could become. Sitting above an existing JORC resource of 21,600 ounces — 72% in the Indicated category — and supported by a well-designed follow-up drilling campaign, Old Prospect is shaping up as a genuine resource-growth story. With mineralisation open in multiple directions, a processing partnership in discussion, and one of the region's largest tenement packages behind it, SCN is a name investors interested in Murchison gold exposure should be watching closely.

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William Hadrian
By William Hadrian
Partnerships Director
William supports Discovery Alert subscribers across Australia and overseas, helping them tailor alerts, troubleshoot technical issues, and optimise platform settings to suit their workflow.
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