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Defense Metals Commences Pilot Flotation Test Program at SGS Lakefield for the Wicheeda Rare Earth Project
VANCOUVER, BC, May 12, 2026 /CNW/ - Defense Metals Corp. ("Defense Metals" or the "Company"; (TSXV: DEFN) (OTCQB: DFMTF) (FSE:35D), a company focused on the
About this update from Defense Metals Corp.
[{"type":"text","content":" VANCOUVER, BC, May 12, 2026 /CNW/ - Defense Metals Corp. (\"Defense Metals\" or the \"Company\"; (TSXV: DEFN) (OTCQB: DFMTF) (FSE:35D), a company focused on the development of its wholly-owned Wicheeda Rare Earth Project (the \"Wicheeda Project\"), located near Prince George, British Columbia, Canada, is pleased to announce the commencement of a confirmatory pilot flotation plant test program for its Wicheeda Project. The program will be conducted at the SGS Canada Inc. metallurgical facility in Lakefield, Ontario. Defense Metals has engaged SGS Canada Inc. (\"SGS\") to undertake the pilot flotation program, which is designed to confirm the results of the 2021 pilot plant, further advance metallurgical development, generate flotation concentrate for hydrometallurgical pilot plant work, and support future engineering studies for the Wicheeda Project. The program will utilize approximately 30 tonnes of drill core material from the Wicheeda deposit in two sub-samples representing planned production from years 1 through 5 and year 6 onwards of the PFS mine plan. SGS was selected based on their experience and reputation as the benchmark for quality and integrity in the collaborative design and execution of a pilot plant of this type. The program will be managed on behalf of Defense Metals by chief metallurgical consultant J.R. Goode, P.Eng. Mr. Goode has an extensive career in the design, monitoring, and interpretation of beneficiation and hydrometallurgical test-work and has over 60 years of experience as a metallurgist working on numerous rare earth projects located in Canada, USA, China, Australia, Brazil, Greenland, Russia, and elsewhere. The primary objective of the pilot flotation campaign is to generate a representative rare earth flotation concentrate grading approximately 50% total rare earth oxides (\"TREO\"). The concentrate produced during the pilot program will be used in a planned downstream hydrometallurgical pilot plant aimed at confirming and optimising the general process conditions of the PFS with the representative concentrate generated from this pilot flotation program. In addition to concentrate production, the continuous pilot-scale operation will generate representative process tailings for downstream testing and characterization. The pilot plant will also confirm metallurgical performance under continuous op...