Delta drills high-grade gold near Thunder Bay

Delta Resources (TSXV: DLTA; US-OTC PINK: DTARF) says new drill results improve the economics of its Delta-1 gold project in northern Ontario.

Drill hole D1-24-90 cut 10 metres grading 15.94 grams gold per tonne from 113 metres depth including 1 metre at 57.80 grams and 0.9 metre at 99.4 grams, Delta said on Friday. Drill hole D1-24-87 returned 10.5 metres at 1.66 grams from 30 metres depth and drill hole D1-24-88 intersected 12.2 metres at 1.05 grams from 85 metres, the company said.

The results from the site 50 km west of Thunder Bay on Lake Superior come from a group of four holes, and one extension hole for a total of 1,371 metres in the company’s 5,000-metre drill campaign this year. It aims to fill in gaps from Delta’s previous drilling in a 2-km strike to a 250-metre vertical depth, and to expand that envelope east, west and deeper.

“Once more, the gold zones continue to show continuity and homogeneity,” president and CEO André Tessier said in a release. “Drill hole D1-24-90 was especially excellent with high grades that are sure to help the economics of the deposit.”

Shares in Delta Resources were unchanged in Toronto on Friday, but they had risen 21% over the past five days to 12¢ apiece, valuing the company at $11.3 million. They’ve traded in a 52-week range of 9¢ and 61¢.

Last May, the company hit a market capitalization of $39.2 million after reporting drill hole D1-23-38 cut 1-metre intervals of 1,636 grams and 697 grams. 

Shebandowan belt

Delta is focusing on the 107-sq.-km project near the Trans-Canada Highway in the Shebandowan Greenstone Belt. It covers a 19-km strike of the Shebandowan structural zone. Gold mineralized zones form a 2.3-km strike, with a higher-grade segment of nearly 950 metres, to a depth of about 250 metres, the company said.

The Delta-1 project is to receive as much as $200,000 in Ontario government funding through the Ontario Junior Exploration Program when the company completes exploration, it said.

The company also holds the 194-sq.-km Delta-2 volcanic massive sulphide gold project in the Chibougamau area about 650 km north of Montreal. It’s betting on similarities to the area’s former Lemoine mine which produced 760,000 tonnes grading 9.6% zinc, 4.2% copper, 4.5 grams gold and 84 grams silver from 1975 to 1983.

Drilling

At Delta-1, the gold zone is dipping shallowly towards the south in contrast to the steep north dip in sections to the west, the company said. The gold zone might have been rotated along northeast-trending structures and drilling last year may have missed the zone, it added.

Hole D1-24-90 targeted the gold zone 50 metres up-dip from the intercept of hole D1-23-67 which cut 40.2 metres grading 0.66 gram including 20.2 metres at 0.95 gram, Delta said.

Last year’s hole D1-23-65 cut 35.5 metres grading 1.39 grams and the company targeted drill hole D1-24-88 at mineralization 60 metres up-dip from it. Drilling overshot the Beta gold zone but intersected the Gamma zone from 85 metres down hole, Delta said.

Drill hole D1-24-87 aimed to intersect the gold zone 50 metres up-dip from the intercept of drill hole D1-23-33 which returned 89.7 metres grading 1.15 grams gold, Delta said. The new hole intersected gold at 30 metres depth, the Gamma zone at 70 metres down and a narrow 0.8 metre zone at 22.3 grams from 130 metres, the company said.