AuKing has approved planning for a 1,000m diamond hole at Tundulu in southern Malawi, and the reason sits in the two holes that came before it.

26NH032 → planned to 300m, finished at 510.6m
26NH023 → planned to 300m, finished at 400.4m

Both intersected carbonatite through to end of hole. Two holes designed to reach 300m ran out of plan before they ran out of rock, and neither has closed the system at depth. Everything below 510.6m is untested.

The approved hole nearly doubles the vertical reach of the drilling to date, and it is funded inside the existing budgeted program rather than through a raise.

Some historical context worth knowing. When JICA surveyed the Chilwa alkaline province in 1987 it drilled Tundulu harder than either of its neighbours: 1,204.8m across 24 holes, against 558.95m at Songwe Hill and no drilling at all at Kangankunde. Songwe Hill and Kangankunde went on to delineated resources under Mkango and Lindian. Tundulu, the most drilled of the three, is the one that then sat comparatively unexplored for four decades.

AuKing has now drilled about four and a half times the historical JICA program at Tundulu, and this single hole is roughly 83% of it.

Still to come: assays from the two completed diamond holes, 27 remaining RC holes, and a maiden resource targeted before the end of 2026.

Full breakdown with the interactive depth data: AKN: Auking approves 1,000m Diamond Hole at Tundulu