Channel sampling of mineralised shear zones exposed in road cuttings at White Cliff Minerals’ Aucu Gold Project in the Kyrgyz Republic has identified significant mineralisation including 2 metres @ 9 grams/tonne (g/t) gold, 1 metre @ 12 g/t gold and 4 metres @ 1.4% copper.
The mineralised zones occur above and along strike from high grade gold mineralisation identified in two holes drilled in 2015. The new gold zones consist of brecciated and highly altered goethite rich sandstone adjacent to granodiorite (granitic) dykes typical of the previous high grade zones encountered.
Three of the new mineralised zones identified represent a single mineralised lode intersected along 150 metres of strike. Gold results for this lode include 2 metres @ 9 g/t gold, 1 metre @ 12 g/t, 4 metres @ 1.7 g/t and 2 metres @ 3 g/t.
Visible gold was also panned from an outcrop sample and the first drill hole in this lode intersected 4 metres @ 59.9 g/t and 1 metre @ 10.3 g/t. The mineralised zones outcrop at surface in road cuttings and can be traced along strike a further 300 metres to the east.
The fourth mineralised zone represents a new structure/lode which is rich in copper and also contains some gold with channel samples intersecting 4 metres @ 1.4% copper and 0.87 g/t gold. The new lode is associated with the contact of a granodiorite with sandstone and contains up to 5% sulphides.
The bulldozer will continue to cut access tracks along an 800 metre section of the mineralised system in preparation for drilling. It is anticipated that additional surface mineralised zones will be exposed from these activities.
To date 388 samples collected from the newly exposed mineralised zones have been submitted for laboratory analysis of gold and multi-elements.
A total of 5000 metres is proposed to be drilled in White Cliff’s 2016 drill program and the diamond drill rig is drilling the second hole of this program. The company is also assessing the viability of procuring a second rig to accelerate the drill program. Drilling is currently targeting the upper gold zone eastern extension where the average grade of mineralisation intersected in the 2015 drill program was 45 g/t gold.
The 2016 exploration program is focused on drilling out an 800 metre long section of the eastern upper gold zone (UGZE) to a maximum vertical depth of 200 metres. Drilling will initially be conducted in 100 metre spaced sections followed by 50 metre infill sections designed to generate an indicated and inferred JORC-compliant gold resource. The exploration target for the UGZE in 2016 is 1-2 million tonnes @ 15-30 g/t for 500,000 to 1.2 million ounces of gold.
gold zones