Francisco hits more gold at Marlin

Vancouver — Randy Reifel-led Francisco Gold (FGX-V) has tabled positive assay results for the final six drill holes completed in December at its Marlin gold-silver project in western Guatemala.

Four of the holes, 65, 66, 67 and 68, tested the southwest and northeast extensions of the Main zone. The remaining two holes, 69 and 70 tested the down dip extension of the Los Cochis corridor, situated 500 metres northwest of the Main zone. Highlights to the results are as follows;

• Hole 65 intersected 83 metres grading 1.24 grams gold per tonne and 14.9 grams silver per tonne starting at a down-hole depth of 92 metres. This included a 1.5-metre interval that cut 99.20 grams gold and 1,730.0 grams silver at a depth of 92 metres. The long interval calculation was based on the high grade assays being cut to 10 grams gold and 100 grams silver.
• Hole 66 intersected 40 metres grading 1.72 grams gold and 25.8 grams silver starting 37 metres down hole.
• Hole 67 intersected 18 metres averaging 0.90 grams gold and 6.9 grams silver starting 41 metres down hole.
• Hole 68 cut 14 metes grading 0.44 gram gold and 1.7 grams silver starting 17 metres down hole.
• Hole 69 intersected 16 metres grading 2.77 grams gold and 141.6 grams silver starting 40 metres down hole.
• Hole 70 hit 23 metres that averaged 1.60 grams gold and 2.9 grams silver starting 93 metres down hole.

Francisco states that hole 65, the most west-southwestern hole drilled to date, hit a bonanza feeder structure and has extended the Main zone’s mineralization an additional 50 metres along strike. The extension of the zone remains open and is said to correlate well with the high resistivity anomaly that has been identified in the area. This resistivity anomaly continues for an additional 400 metres west-southwest and Francisco believes it may continue for more than 1 km to the anomaly at Ajel.

The last two holes, 69 and 70 were drilled through the Los Cochis structural corridor and tested the down dip extension of the structure below trench T-19 (26 metres grading 4.40 grams gold equivalent per tonne). The hole intersection is believed to be the true width of mineralization. Trenching and rock chip sampling completed so far along the Los Cochis corridor has outlined a minimum strike length of 1.1 km. Future drilling along this strike will test the down dip extension of several other trenches which returned values that ranged from 2-to-26 metres grading up to 9.5 grams gold equivalent per tonne.

Francisco reports that drilling is scheduled to resume at Marlin within two weeks. Additional step-out holes will target the high resistivity anomaly at the western end of the Main zone as well as the Los Cochis zone. In addition, Francisco will drill the Ajel target, situated 1 km west of the Main zone. Two IP and Resistivity survey lines identified a shallow high resistivity anomaly that trends west-southwest across a broad area of argillic alteration and abundant high-level quartz.

To date the junior has drilled 70 holes, totaling 7,604 metres, into the Marlin project. Over the Main zone, 61 holes have delineated a high-grade mineralized zone that measures 700-by-255 metres. This zone remains open to the west-southwest, east-northeast and at depth along the main feeder fault.

Francisco is well funded with $30.5 million in its coffers and has no debt.