Tournigan drills Curraghinalt

Vancouver — Drilling by Tournigan Gold (TVC-V) has intersected high-grade gold mineralization at the Curraghinalt project in Northern Ireland. The program is designed to upgrade the resource classification to the measured category.

Holes 13 and 14 intersected a high-grade gold shoot. Hole 13 cut 3.4 metres averaging 68.07 grams gold per tonne starting at a down-hole depth of 39.6 metres, and this intersection included a 1.3-metre portion that averaged 183.23 grams gold.

Hole 14 intersected a 4.06-metre section of 42.66 grams gold starting at 42.9 metres down-hole, including a 1.5-metre section grading 103.22 grams gold.

Also, hole 12 cut 1.9 metres of 57.16 grams gold starting at 20.4 metres down-hole in an adjacent oreshoot. This was followed by a 1.1-metre section that averaged 13.7 grams gold at a down-hole depth of 59.6 metres, plus a 1.3-metre interval of 11.4 grams gold starting at 144.3 metres down-hole.

Tournigan interprets these ore shoots as being open-ended to depth. They are directly above an existing underground exploration drift, which would provide immediate access for mining.

The Curraghinalt vein system can be followed for 8 km. The mineralized trend lies entirely within Tournigan’s existing prospecting licences.

Curraghinalt is a mesothermal gold quartz vein system with an inferred resource of 468,097 tonnes averaging 16.96 grams gold per tonne, or 230,000 contained ounces.

The company expects to drill six more holes at Curraghinalt, the goal being to advance the project to production.

Tournigan has agreed to buy the Curraghinalt and Tyrone gold projects from Strongbow Resources (sr-v). Prior to this, it had the option of earning into the projects over seven years.

The Curraghinalt and Tyrone licences cover 346 sq. km and are under option to Tournigan with staged expenditures of $7 million to earn 60%, delivery of feasibility studies to earn 75%, and a net-present-value buyout option on the remaining 25% interests. In order to secure full ownership, Tournigan will issue 5 million shares to Strongbow on completion of a definitive agreement and another 5 million shares when Tournigan’s directors approve mine construction. Strongbow will be allowed to appoint one person to Tournigan’s board. The 10 million Tournigan shares will be subject to hold periods and may be subject to escrow restrictions.

Tournigan also intends to carry out exploration and development at its Kremnica gold project in the Slovak Republic. The company recently increased the Kremnica indicated resource, which, at a cutoff grade of 1 gram gold per tonne, is pegged at 5.6 million tonnes averaging 2.11 grams gold and 15.43 grams silver, or 384,231 contained ounces gold and 2.8 million contained ounces silver.

There is also an inferred resource of 8.3 million tonnes averaging 2.01 grams gold and 16.06 grams silver, or 540,733 contained ounces gold and 4.3 million contained ounces silver.