Birim Goldfields drills to expand gold zone on Cluster

Montreal-based Birim Goldfields (BGI-T, BRGFF-O) recently started a 9-hole follow-up drill program at the Chert Ridge prospect on its Cluster property in south-central Ghana, where two gold zones have already been confirmed.

Two drill holes in Zone A, which has a strike length of 220 metres, intersected 10 metres grading 3.09 grams gold per tonne and 12 metres grading 2.88 grams gold.

On Zone B, where mineralization has been delineated along 500 metres of strike, results from two holes included 10 metres grading 4.79 grams gold per tonne and 13 metres grading 6.84 grams gold, including a shorter, 1-metre section of 77.56 grams gold per tonne.

Birim hopes to extend the known mineralized zones along strike and at depth and will also do some scout drilling in hopes of uncovering two additional mineralized zones.

The new zones are located in the historic Santa Fe trench. A 3-metre intersection in Zone C graded 1.69 grams gold per tonne while a 6-metre intersection in Zone D graded 1.29 grams gold, including a 2-metres interval that averaged 3.37 grams gold.

Five reverse-circulation drill holes have been completed so far, however, Birim is currently waiting on drilling equipment for the remaining four holes, which require diamond tails to fully intersect the mineralized zone at depth.

The Cluster property is located in the Bui Belt — a relatively underexplored gold belt similar to the Ashanti and Sefwi gold belts that Ghana is known for. Birim has 13 separate prospecting licences in the area including the Tinga gold concession, where a 7,900-metre drill program has been completed on the Far East gold deposit.

Far East drill results included intervals of 7.1 metres grading 3.05 grams gold per tonne and 7.8 metres grading 4.89 grams gold. The grades defined a high-grade, shallowly plunging mineralization thickening within the deposit with a minimum strike of 170 metres.

Birim has three exploration properties on Ghana’s 20-million-oz. Bibian-Sefwi Belt. The company also has a maximum 3.5% net smelter return royalty agreement with Golden Star Resources (gsc-t, gss-x) for the Dunkwa property, which has a proven and probable reserve of about 1.5 million tonnes grading 4.53 grams gold per tonne, or 230,000 oz. gold. Dunkwa also includes Anglogold Ashanti’s (au-n, agd-l, ang-j) Mampon deposit, which hosts reserves of 1 million tonnes grading 5.16 grams gold per tonne. Mampon is scheduled to start production in late 2007.