Adrian gets mixed results from Stikine Arch drilling

Drilling on the Ski project situated directly north of the rich Eskay Creek deposit in the Stikine Arch area of northwestern British Columbia is returning mixed results. The drilling is part of an ongoing program conducted by Prime Resources Group (VSE) which, along with Stikine Resources (VSE), is earning a 50% interest in the property from Adrian Resources (VSE). To earn their collective interest, Prime and Stikine must incur exploration expenditures totalling $5 million over several years.

Expectations for the property were high at the outset of the program; the first drill holes on the Adrian ground were within a football throw of some very rich holes on the Prime-Stikine property. With the mineralization obviously trending on to the Ski claims, Adrian stock at $8 per share seemed equitable to many.

The market price of Adrian has subsequently been the subject of wild fluctuations on heavy volume as players reacted to the inevitable blizzard of rumors concerning the success of the program.

The halving of Adrian’s share price after the first assay results became public, followed by a second split in price on rumors of the latest results, has brought the stock back to what many see as a more reasonable price level.

Prime has been drilling fences of holes starting at the property boundary and working north. Since the mineralized zone is plunging to the north, its depth of more than 1,400 ft. makes it difficult to intersect. As a result, some of the drilling has not intersected the actual zone which is in the order of 150 ft. wide laterally.

The drill holes which have intersected the zone include AD90- 01, -02, -04 and -07 on Section 13+07N; AD90-09, -13 and -14 on Section 13+50N; and AD90-12 on Section 14+00N. The results confirm an extension of the Eskay Creek body on to the Adrian ground for at least 500 ft.

Although the drilling has intersected reasonable gold values over good widths, the width of sections containing massive sulphides do not compare to those seen on the property to the south. The massive sulphides encountered on the Ski property to date have been less than 5 ft., while the Eskay Creek property has had numerous intersects exceeding 50 ft.

Doug Hurst, mining analyst at McDermid St. Lawrence, notes that the results look intriguing but appear to be uneconomic because of their depth.

Prime is hardly giving up on the property, however. With its $1 million commitment for this year already spent, the company is proceeding with the drilling program of step-out holes to the north.

In addition, the company plans to drill two other targets. One, a gold-silver-copper-zinc soil geochemical anomaly situated to the west of the current drilling on Sections 13+00N and 13+50N, and the other, an area of IP anomalies on Sections 21+00N and 24+00N.

Whatever the outcome of the drilling program, Adrian still has claim to the staking gap on the Eskay Creek property itself. The claim gap is estimated to cover reserves of about 65,000 tons averaging 0.92 oz. gold and 57.4 oz. silver per ton, plus 1.1% lead and 2.2% zinc at a cutoff grade of 0.25 oz. gold.

Adrian has about 8.5 million shares outstanding and working capital of about $5.5 million.

The following are assay results from recent drilling: Width Gold Silver Hole Section (ft.) (oz./ton) (oz./ton) 9 13+50N 62 0.17 3.7 including: 20 0.18 8.0 23 0.21 2.8 10 13+07N no significant assays 11 15+50N no significant assays 12 14+00N 7 0.12 2.3 13 13+50N 40 0.10 5.8 including: 10 0.22 18.2 13 0.15 1.1 14 13+50N 10 0.14 0.7 15 14+00N no significant assays