Empire strikes deep copper-gold-moly (November 06, 2008)

Vancouver Having wrapped up a 1,300-metre, six-hole drill program at its Bursa property 120 km south of Istanbul, Turkey, Empire Mining (EPC-V) hit long, near-surface, copper-gold-molybdenum intercepts in five of six holes drilled at the Karapinar target.

Hole 6 returned as much as 100 metres grading 0.5% copper, 0.007% moly and 0.1 gram gold per tonne starting from surface. Hole 7 cut 128 metres grading 0.31% copper, 0.013% moly and 0.11 gram gold starting 6 metres downhole. And hole 8 returned 224 metres starting from surface grading 0.36% copper, 0.011% moly and 0.08 gram gold.

These results were good news for Empire as they confirm mineralization first encountered by Rio Tinto (RTP-N, RIO-l) and delineate a near-surface mineralized area so far about 400 by 400 metres in size and open in all directions.

What also caught Empire’s eyes were supergene enriched intercepts hit on the southwest margin of drilling that included native copper. Within the longer 224-metre intercept hole 8 cut 25 metres grading 1.01% copper, 0.012% moly and 0.21 gram gold starting 43 metres downhole.

Empire says it is evaluating the higher grade intervals for possible copper recovery by leaching.

Empire can earn a 65% interest in the project from Anatolia Minerals Development (ANO-T, ALIAF-O) if it pays Anatolia US$520,000 over five years (beginning in 2007) and issues the company 5% of its fully diluted shares as it stands in 2012. It must also spend US$7.5 million on exploration over five years and complete a prefeasibility study by the end of six.

As for ongoing work on Bursa, Empire President and CEO David Cliff says in an email, “Anatolia (is) having bench scale metallurgical recovery testwork carried out, as well as water quality testing.”

And anticipating the coming year Cliff says, “We are looking at the drillhole results for follow-up drilling aimed at extending the resource potential and helping define the potentially leachable mineralisation (at Bursa).”

In terms of financing this summer Empire closed a $2 million dollar private placement issuing about 6.9 million units at 30 a unit. Units gave holders the right to one common share and half a purchase warrant. Each warrant entitled holders to a common share at 38, redeemable until Feb. 6, 2010.

On news of the drill results Empire’s share price was steady at 7.5. It has about 24.5 million shares issued and outstanding.