Serra Pelada Returns Colossal Results

Drilling at the site of Brazil’s epic 1980s gold rush at Serra Pelada is yielding spectacular results for joint-venture partners Colossus Minerals (CSI-T, COLUF-O) and Coomigasp, a 45,000-strong co-operative of local miners.

The drill program was focused primarily on the central mineralized zone, which overprints metasediments occupying the hinge and inner limbs of a northwest-facing, southwest-plunging, reclined synclinorium that plunges gently southwest from the historical open pit in Brazil’s northeastern Para state, where more than 100,000 artisanal miners once clawed out 2 million oz. gold.

Final results from the 5,000- metre first-phase drilling program yielded remarkable grades. Hole 18 cut 60.5 metres grading 14.37 grams gold per tonne, 1.81 grams platinum and 2.46 grams palladium, including 24.5 metres at 29.89 grams gold, 1.69 grams platinum and 3.53 grams palladium. (True widths have yet to be established.)

Another hole, No. 13, returned 23 metres grading 20.68 grams gold, 3.26 grams platinum and 3.91 grams palladium, including 7.5 metres at 54.62 grams gold, 8.64 grams platinum and 9.95 grams palladium.

The drilling has extended Serra Pelada’s high-grade gold mineralization, including sub-zones rich in platinum group elements (PGEs), along 250 metres of strike length, downplunge and southwest of the historical open pit, in what is being called the central mineralized zone.

Holes 14 through 16 all encountered gold-platinum-palladium mineralization on the fringes of the central mineralized zone and demonstrate the strong lateral and vertical continuity of the zone, the company says.

A new zone to the west of the central mineralized zone was also confirmed in hole 17, which exhibited a high PGE-to-gold ratio.

Preliminary work on the exposed and drilled red and grey altered siltstones also indicate that these lithologies may support stable pit walls or underground access.

In a statement, Vic Wall, Colossus’s president, said with infill drilling in the second-phase program, a high-grade portion of the central mineralized zone that has started to shape up could be “advanced rapidly to resource stage.”

Colossus plans to complete its resource model this year.

At presstime, Colossus was trading at $1.40 per share. The Torontobased junior has a 52-week trading range of 43¢-$4 per share and has 42.67 million shares outstanding.