Andean drills high-grade oreshoot at Cerro Negro

Andean Resources (AND-T, AND-A) has found its Cerro Negro project in southern Argentina contains more than meets the eye.

The latest drill results from the Eureka West vein returned a 21-metre intersection from hole EDD-749 grading 32.3 grams gold per tonne and 904 grams silver from 197 metres depth.

“It is intriguing that at Eureka, we have the top of a large epithermal system that is covered and our ongoing geological mapping is providing evidence that there is much more to the system than what appears on the surface,” said Cerro Negro chief geologist Dave Shatwell in a statement.

Andean has completed 12,000 metres of a 30,000-metre drill program. In December, three rigs were focused on expanding and improving the existing resource for Cerro Negro before the year-end cutoff for an upcoming prefeasibility study.

The company expects to finish the study by March.

The last resource estimate came out in October, with a combined total of 1.5 million oz. gold, using a cutoff of 1.5 grams gold per tonne.

Other drill results include a 15-metre intersection in hole EDD-748 grading 10.5 grams gold and 95 grams silver from 361 metres depth and 8 metres grading 32.4 grams gold and 570 grams silver from 382 metres.

Hole EDD-748 intersected the same high-grade, westerly plunging oreshoot as EDD-749, but was 150 metres deeper.

Hole EDD-744 returned 2.25 metres grading 6.4 grams gold per tonne and 200 grams silver from 120 metres depth.

Both the top and bottom of the oreshoot were intersected as well, but it remains open down-plunge to the west.

Andean is waiting on results from a 100-metre stepout hole beyond the current western limit before continuing in that direction because the topography (a hill) is making drilling more difficult and expensive.

This month, Andean plans to drill two new potential oreshoots, where past drilling has returned 17 metres grading 9.2 grams gold per tonne and 69 grams silver, as well as the five holes on the Eureka vein with grades high enough for underground mining.

Beyond that, another 4 km along the Eureka main vein has not yet been drilled.

Andean shares rose about 14% or 22 on the news to $1.81 on a trading volume of 160,000 shares.