Majors come up empty in Otish Mountains

The Canadian diamond division of BHP Billiton (BHP-N) has failed to turn up any significant results following a first round of drilling that tested 18 various pipe-like geophysical anomalies on Majescor Resources‘ (MAJ-V) Portage project in the Otish Mountains of north-central Quebec.

The project sits down-ice from where partners Ashton Mining of Canada (ACA-T) and Soquem discovered six kimberlitic bodies. Last fall, the pair discovered two diamond-bearing bodies after drilling an initial four targets, and this winter Ashton and Soquem were four-for-four.

Majescor says the next round of fieldwork will focus on increasing the till sample density in order to define drill targets. Responding to market speculation that its kimberlite indicator minerals may have traveled down-ice from Ashton’s ground, Majescor says many of its anomalous sites do not lie directly down-ice from the known kimberlite bodies. Majescor further emphasizes that there are enough barren sample sites up-ice that one can reasonably infer the source should be on Majescor’s ground.

Between 1996 and 2000, Ashton and Soquem, a Quebec Crown corporation, completed a sampling program over a large portion of the eastern Superior Craton in northern Quebec. More than 1,700 heavy mineral samples were collected from an area measuring 425,000 sq. km, for an approximate density of one sample per 250 sq. km. This work identified priority areas with anomalous concentrations of kimberlite indicator minerals. In August 2000, Ashton and Soquem staked 1,000 sq. km in two key areas: the Otish Mountains and Caniapiscau. Today, the joint venture holds more than 3,800 sq. km of mineral permits in the province.

Once Ashton began staking ground in the Otish Mountains, Majescor responded by acquiring 1,028 sq. km of ground down-ice from Ashton. Majescor zeroed in on a large, loosely defined, 25-by-45-km corridor of anomalous kimberlite indicator minerals that it had outlined during a couple of seasons of till sampling. Majescor later optioned the property to BHP Billiton Diamonds, which can earn a 56% interest by funding all costs through to production.

BHP subjected the property to an 8,500-line-km airborne geophysical survey and followed up on some 30 targets with ground geophysics and further till sampling before testing its first target.

Details of the next phase of exploration will be available in late May or early June.

Elsewhere in the region, Ashton’s good fortune has apparently rubbed off on Pure Gold Minerals (PUG-T), which has intersected a kimberlitic-like rock while drilling the Tichegami River property, more than 100 km south of the Renard discoveries and just north of the Beaver Lake kimberlite. Pure Gold intersected 118 metres of a breccia intrusion under 20 metres of cover. The hole was shut down while still in the rock unit at 138 metres of depth.

The intersection was examined in the field and described as the “upper level crater facies of an intrusion of igneous rock with characteristics that appear to be consistent with a kimberlitic source.” A second hole collared at minus 50 degrees from the same site drilled out of the pipe-like body at 41.5 metres down-hole.

Pure Gold is earning a 60% interest in the 81-sq.-km property from Ditem Explorations (DIT-V) by spending $1 million over three years.