High Grade zone extends deeper (December 11, 2000)

Exploration drilling at the Red Lake gold mine in northern Ontario has extended the Hanging Wall 5 zone at depth. The zone is one of several comprising the producing High Grade deposit.

Goldcorp (G-T) reports that three holes intersected the lens 152 metres beneath the reserve outline. The intervals, starting at 1.9 km below surface, are also 61 metres deeper than, and 46 metres west of, two high-grade intersections reported in the summer.

Hole 979 yielded the widest interval: 24.6 ft. (starting 1,119 ft. down-hole) grading an uncut 19.89 oz. Hole 978 returned 21 ft. (starting at 1,136 ft.) averaging an uncut 0.91 oz., while hole 977 averaged an uncut 30.64 oz. over 9.5 ft. (starting at 1,191 ft.). The results complement two earlier holes, which returned 6.5 ft. grading 20.59 oz. and 2.9 ft. grading 9.49 oz.

Exploration drilling continues elsewhere in the mine. Among the better preliminary results are:

– 60 grams over 0.91 metre (starting at a down-hole depth of 381 metres) from the West Extension area;

– 59.8 grams over 1.46 metres (starting at 155 metres) from the Far East area; and

– 37.8 grams over 0.52 metre (starting at 194 metres) in the footwall of the High Grade deposit.

Generally, grades and widths varied widely, and many holes came back dry.

Meanwhile, the mill is operating at its design capacity of 600 tons daily. By mid-November, 51,050 tons grading 1.41 oz. had been milled to produce 54,210 oz. gold.

About two-thirds of the mill feed is coming from production headings; the remainder, from a stockpile on surface. The stockpile, which averages 1.93 oz. per ton, will be depleted by February, by which time underground mining will have been ramped up to compensate.

By year-end, Goldcorp expects to have produced 80,000 oz., or 23% more than originally predicted. The increase is attributed to higher recovery rates and better gold grades.

Reserves in the High Grade deposit are pegged at 1.45 million tons grading 1.37 oz. per ton.

Elsewhere in the district, AngloGold (AU-N) has budgeted US$500,000 to explore 20,000 ha of ground owned by Rubicon Minerals (RMX-V). The major can earn up to a 70% stake in the claims by paying US$250,000 in cash and spending US$3 million on exploration over five years.

The partners completed geophysical and preliminary surface exploration. The targets will be followed up by ground geophysics and drilling.