Drilling at Erdene Resource Development Corp’s Bayan Khundii Gold Project in southwest Mongolia has expanded the new Midfield gold zone under younger cover. Erdene says the results include some of the highest grades and the longest mineralised intervals intersected to date.
The Midfield zone is 200 metres north of the original discovery area that includes the Striker and Gold Hill zones where gold mineralisation is exposed at surface. Striker and Gold Hill form the southwest portion of a 1.7km by 500 metre target area and have been the focus of the majority of Erdene’s drill programs to date.
Gold mineralisation was intersected in all eight step-out confirmation holes at Midfield with visible gold observed in six holes. The eight holes provided a total of 1370 metres.
Best results are: 149 metres from 23 metres @ 2.1 g/t gold, including 41 metres @ 5.2 g/t and 15 metres @ 6.5 g/t; 72 metres from 108 metres @ 4.0 g/t; 16 metres from 19 metres @ 3.9 g/t and 40 metres from 106 metres @ 1.0 g/t.
The results have established lateral continuity of the new mineralized Midfield Zone in all directions. Geophysical surveys indicate the alteration zones that host gold mineralisation at Midfield extend under cover along the 1.7km north-northeast trend.
An exploration drill program is now being designed by Erdene to test additional target areas.
Erdene’s president and CEO Peter Akerley said, “The results indicate that significant gold mineralisation lies under younger cover at Bayan Khundii, greatly expanding the footprint of this high-grade, near-surface discovery, and support our belief that this gold system has considerable size potential.
“In 2017, we will launch a resource drilling program, complimented by an extensive exploration drilling program designed to expand the known areas of gold mineralization at Bayan Khundii as well as our other targets in the district including Altan Nar.”
The latest results support extensive future testing beneath the younger Cretaceous units throughout this trend with drilling scheduled to resume early in the second quarter.
The company will continue with its dual objective of increasing confidence in areas with established resource potential and expanding the perimeter and testing new areas within the larger 1.7km trend in order to establish potential extensions and boundaries to the gold system.
Erdene