$13.4 Million Exploration Program For Railroad-Pinon Project
VANCOUVER - Gold Standard Ventures Corp. reported plans for the 2016 exploration program on its 100%-owned/controlled Railroad-Pinion Project on Nevada’s Carlin Trend. The program is expected to cost $13.4 million USD and will include approximately 43,000 m of reverse-circulation (RC) and core drilling in a total of 100 holes with the majority of the drilling focused at the Dark Star and Pinion oxide gold deposits.
The program is designed to aggressively follow-up on 2015 drill results at the North Dark Star oxide gold discovery, expand known resources at Dark Star and Pinion, and test new high-value targets at North Bullion and Bald Mountain.
Jonathan Awde, CEO and Director of Gold Standard said, The Company is in a strong position financially with no debt and a treasury with over $40 million CAD as a result of recent investments from OceanaGold and Goldcorp. These recent corporate investments are appreciated by the company and a great compliment to the technical work and success we have been able to do in one of the most prolific gold belts in the world. It’s going to be a very exciting year for our investors as we undertake aggressive exploration programs in the coming months.
At the North Dark Star discovery, located north of the Dark Star maiden resource, complete about 10,300 m of RC and core drilling in 22 holes to expand areas of known shallow oxide gold mineralization north and south of DS15-13. Gold mineralization is hosted in favorable carbonate rocks bioclastic limestone, silty limestone and calcareous sandstone within coarse conglomerate debris flow unit. This Pennsylvanian-Permian unit also hosts the main Dark Star deposit to the south, and represents a new, unconventional host rock on the Carlin Trend.
Within the 6 km-long Dark Star Structural Corridor, complete about 10,100 m of RC drilling in 22 holes to test new targets south of the Dark Star maiden resource. The Dark Star Structural Corridor is a north-trending horst defined by gravity, CSAMT, geologic mapping, and soil sampling. The corridor is largely untested by drilling.
As background, the maiden Dark Star NI 43-101 compliant resource estimate was completed last year by APEX Geoscience of Edmonton, Canada and included an Inferred Mineral Resource of 23.11 million tonnes grading 0.51 grams per tonne (g/t) gold (Au), totaling 375,000 ounces of gold using a cut-off of 0.14 g Au/t. This oxide resource is open in multiple directions. The North Dark Star discovery was made in late 2015. Three holes (DS15-10, -11 and -13) completed 515m north of the maiden resource returned multiple, significant oxidized intercepts containing gold values above the cut-off grade of 0.14 g Au/t. Core hole DS15-13 intersected 15.4 meters of 1.85 grams gold per tonne (g Au/t) and 97.0 meters of 1.61 g Au/t. North Dark Star remains open in multiple directions.
At Northwest Pinion, complete about 5,700 m of RC drilling to extend known oxide mineralization along the South Fault Corridor, an important control on gold mineralization at Pinion.
The new Sentinel Breccia target, 12 RC holes (about 3,700 m) will test for bedrock extensions to gold mineralization identified by surface rock samples. This undrilled target is a hematitic, silicified multi-lithic breccia within the footwall of the north-striking Bullion Fault Zone, located 350m north of Pinion. At a 0.14 g Au/t cutoff, continuous rock chip channel samples returned seven significant weight-averaged, composite intervals that included 27.4m of 0.35 g Au/t and 12.2m of 0.46 g Au/t.
At the new Irene target, 2.4 km northwest of the Pinion resource, complete approximately 1,800 m of RC drilling. Irene is located along the projection of the South Fault Corridor, an important control on gold mineralization at Pinion. At this location, north and northwest-trending gold-in-soil (values ranging from <1 to 325 ppb) and arsenic-in-soil (values ranging from 10 to 2670 ppm) anomalies are coincident with silicified, quartz-and-barite-veined breccias in the Chainman Formation above the favorable breccia host horizon at the top of Devil’s Gate Limestone. The NW Main Zone, Far Northwest and South Pinion targets, complete about 3,000 m of RC drilling to extend areas of known oxide mineralization outward from the Pinion resource.
North Bullion is to drill nine holes (approximately 4,800 m) to extend areas of west-northwest and north-trending, high-grade gold mineralization in the Lower Breccia Zone and test new targets recognized in multiple data sets including grade x thickness contours, structure contours, gravity and CSAMT.
At Bald Mountain on the northern flank of the Bullion Stock target, drill up to eight RC holes (about 3,600 m) to test new oxide gold targets developed within a 4 km-long west-northwest-striking dike-filled corridor. In 2013, core hole RRB13-01 intersected 56.1m of 1.47 g Au/t including 7.3m of 5.66 g Au/t in oxidized, multi-lithic collapse breccia (mlbx) developed along the contact between the Tripon Pass Formation and the underlying Devils Gate Limestone (see news release dated October 2, 2013). The Bald Mountain mineralization occurs in the same stratigraphic position as mlbx hosted gold at Pinion and North Bullion.
Gold Standard pre-development program will also initiate permitting, metallurgical and economic studies to move Pinion and Dark Star toward development.
Mac Jackson, Gold Standard’s Vice President of Exploration said, With the recent strategic financings, we are in a great position to build on the North Dark Star discovery and aggressively explore other high quality targets at Railroad-Pinion. There is a consistent history of the growth of deposits and districts on the Carlin Trend. We are still in the early stages of exploring the Railroad-Pinion-Dark Star district. This year, we expect to add significant additional resources and move our existing deposits closer to production. With the budget we have been given and the opportunities before us, we also believe we could make another major discovery in this program.