Drilling Commences At Eastside Gold Project

VANCOUVER - Columbus Gold Corp. has initiated a 12 hole 3,700 meter RC drill program at Target 5 at its Eastside gold project in Nevada.  Target 5 is located about 8 km (5 miles) south of the Original Zone where Columbus announced an initial NI 43-101 pit-constrained Inferred resource estimate consisting of 35,780,000 tonnes grading 0.63g gold equivalent per tonne, for a total of 721,000 ounces1 of gold equivalent (using a cut-off grade of 0.15g gold per tonne and a gold/silver ratio of 60:1). Eastside also hosts an historical resource of 11,177,761 tons grading 0.024 ounces gold per ton (0.82g gold per tonne) for a total of 272,153 ounces2 gold.

Eastside gold mineralization occurs in a discrete package of overlapping, rhyolite flow dome complexes which were emplaced and/or erupted 7.2 million years ago.  These flow dome complexes are confined to an outcrop belt about 3.2 km (2 miles) wide and 11.2 km (7 miles) long which is completely enclosed in Columbus Gold‚s claim block.  Detailed mapping and sampling of the entire claim block by Columbus geologists has yielded numerous targets at Eastside.

Columbus geologic and alteration mapping, along with surface geochemical sampling, indicates that Target 5 is geologically identical to the Original Zone, where essentially all drilling has occurred to date.  At Target 5, a rhyolite dome complex intrudes tuffs and volcanic breccias which were extruded as the rhyolite was emplaced. The rhyolite dome and eruptive complex was emplaced on a basement of Tertiary andesite lavas and lahars and Paleozoic sedimentary rocks.

Hydrothermal alteration is widespread at Target 5, consisting of widespread iron staining, replacement silicification, and zones of quartz veining, with large areas of acid leaching or steam-heated ground. The steam-heated ground, interpreted to have formed at surface above boiling hydrothermal solutions at depth, consists of opaline silica, kaolinite, and fine-grained alunite. North, northwest, and northeastˆtrending structures are present at Target 5 and control hydrothermal alteration in places.  

Geochemical sampling at Target 5 consists of about 150 surface samples of outcrop and float. Sampling results are similar to those at the Original Zone where gold, silver, arsenic, antimony, and molybdenum are anomalous. Target 5 surface samples contain gold (ranging from 0-1.08 g/t gold), silver (ranging from 0-99 g/t silver), arsenic (ranging from 0-464 ppm), antimony (ranging from 0-240 ppm), and molybdenum (ranging from 0-69 ppm).