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Target
Silver-Gold-Copper in Epithermal Breccias
Comments
The ore targets are large epithermal veins and breccias hosted in Jurassic volcanics. The veins and breccias contain silver-copper-gold plus lead and zinc. Some of the drill intercepts contain bonanza grades exceeding 1,000 g/t silver and 5% copper. Veins and breccias occur across a belt more than 2 km wide and more than 8 km in length. The Company has drilled 63 holes and is now calculating preliminary reserves.
Business / Work Plan
We expect to farm this property out to a joint venture partner in the coming months.
Hectares
43,621
Overview
The Toruel property is located in Rio Negro Province near the small town of Los Menucos.
The area was exploited in the 1940's by small scale local miners looking for lead, silver, and fluorite.
The most prominent mineralization on the property is the Toruel vein. This vein system comprises a fissure vein with numerous smaller veins splitting off the main vein to form smaller, sub-parallel or symoidal veins.
The main vein system can be divided into two blocks, an eastern block and a western block separated by several hundred meters of alluvial cover in a small sandy valley.
The western block is shorter than the east block, geochemical values are lower (although still strongly anomalous), and the vein system is generally thinner, ranging from 1 to perhaps 4 m in width.
The western block has strongly silicified areas >10m wide, along the main structure and with a strong sericitic alteration assemblage. The central part of the structure is a quartz vein 0.50 m thick. The gold anomalies are lower than 1 g/t and with silver values generally less than 200 g/t .
The eastern block shows more pronounced topography and forms a low ridge up to 20 m high and 100 m wide. The vein system has a geometry of splays and horse tail veins and veinlets splitting off of the main structure.
This part of the vein can be traced for more than 1,200 m along strike and is still open-ended. The main part of this vein averages more than 5 m wide and surface channel samples show silver values averaging in excess of 400 g/t with one sample containing 5,871 g/t silver.
Gold anomalies are variable ranging from 0.14 g/t up to 7g/t but in general the average is closer to 0.50 g/t Au.
The maximum values in the main vein zone in the splay area and junction point are the following :
| Gold |
5.24 ppm |
| Silver |
830 ppm |
| Copper |
5031 ppm |
| Molybdenum |
823 ppm |
| Lead |
10.14% |
| Zinc |
6102 ppm |
| Arsenic |
534 ppm |
| Antimony |
0.095% |
| Mercury |
22 ppm |
These values suggest the possibility of bonanza ore targets in this vein.
Mapping and detailed sampling are in progress. A trenching program is planned to start in March and drilling is planned to start in late May, 2005.
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