Expat launches field program

Vancouver — In the midst of trying to raise the $1 million needed to secure the Kudz Ze Kayah base metal property, Expatriate Resources (EXR-V) is gearing up to launch a July drill program targeting the nearby Red Line property in the Finlayson district of the Yukon.

Major zinc producer Cominco (CLT-T) recently granted the junior a payment extension for its purchase of the Kudz Ze Kayah deposit.

According to the amended agreement, Expatriate will have until Sept. 5 to make the $1-million payment which was originally due May 24. It is the first of four annual principal payments that are part of an agreement made last year with Cominco, whereby Expatriate could acquire a 100% interest in the Kudz Ze Kayah deposit and surrounding properties.

Kudz Ze Kayah is a fundamental part of Expatriate’s plan to develop two deposits in the region.

In return for the extension, Expatriate will pay Cominco $100,000 and interest on the $1 million from May 24 until the date of payment. All other terms of the agreement remain the same. Expatriate continues to seek financing and remains confident that it can raise the money.

The Finlayson project comprises both Kudz Ze Kayah, which is owned by Expatriate under a purchase agreement with Cominco, and the Wolverine deposit, which is owned 60% by Expatriate and 40% by Atna Resources (ATN-T).

Nearby, exploration on the company’s wholly owned Red Line and Goal Net properties has begun.

Expatriate plans to start drilling on the Red line property, where a horizontal-loop electromagnetic ground survey defined a 500-metre-long conductor north of another shallow conductor. The shallow conductor was previously tested by drill holes that returned narrow intervals of massive sulphides.

Geophysical and geochemical field surveys are under way on the Goal Net property. The aim is to evaluate the extension of a massive-sulphide horizon discovered last fall. Narrow massive sulphides were intersected in two holes spaced about 400 metres apart. Previous soil surveys defined numerous zinc-lead-copper-silver-gold anomalies in an area measuring 4 km by 6 km.

All the massive sulphides known to exist on these properties are low in selenium concentration (a problem that has plagued the two previously discovered deposits) and appear to correlate with the rhyolitic rocks that host the GP4F deposit, 7 km to the northwest.

Expatriate believes GP4F, as well as the Red Line and Goal Net discoveries, represent a lower mineralized horizon and potentially host significant tonnages.