Placer steps up drilling at Indian Ranch

Vancouver — Placer Dome (PDG-T) intends to drill an additional 9,800 ft. at the Indian Ranch property in Nevada.

The property is 75%-owned by White Knight Resources (WKR-V), with the remainder held by a U.S. subsidiary of Cranbrook, B.C.-based Chapleau Resources (CHI-V). The property is in Eureka Cty., adjacent to the Cortez joint venture of Placer Dome and Rio Tinto (RTP-N). Last month at Cortez, high gold grades were reported over hundreds of feet, and it is this discovery that accounts for the increase in activity in the area.

Although Placer had drilled 2,500 ft. on the property in two holes last year, it came up empty. White Knight says Placer drilled two targets it considered low priority in order to meet work commitments.

Since then, Placer has done geochemical, geological and geophysical surveying that suggests the southern projection of the “Coal Canyon window” is buried on the Indian Ranch property. Placer’s geologists are quoted as saying that “the principal stratigraphic, structural and geologic features recognized in and around this window closely resemble those within the Cortez joint venture. These include, the Roberts Mountain thrust, lower plate calcareous lithologies, intrusive bodies with contact metamorphic aurioles, widespread alteration, and a gold-arsenic-antimony-mercury geochemical signature.”

Placer is exploring Indian Ranch via a binding agreement for development whereby it can earn a 60% interest in the property by spending US$2 million over four years.