Drilling resumes at Kena (September 26, 2002)

Vancouver — With new partner Kinross Gold (K-T) footing the bill, Frank Lang-led Sultan Minerals (SUL-V) has launched a 4,500 metre drill program over the Kena gold project near Nelson, British Columbia.

The program will target the Gold Mountain zone with around 2,600 metres, while the remaining amount will be used to test the South Gold zone, the Great Western target and the Starlight-Daylight trend.

Kinross will fund the drilling as part of an earlier agreement to earn a 60% stake in the project. Under the agreement, Kinross will fund at least $500,000 in exploration cost this year, plus another $500,000 by Sept. 4, 2003 to acquire the right to earn its interest in the 77-sq.-km property. The gold producer must then spend another $9 million over 5-years and make annual payments of $250,000 to take hold of 60% of the project. Sultan will remain project operator until the option begins and then Kinross can elect to take over.

The project covers claims wholly-owned by Sultan, as well as six properties held under option by junior.

Between 2000 and 2002, Sultan drilled a total of 45 holes into the Gold Mountain zone. Four of the first five holes cut broad low-grade mineralization ranging up to 1.87 grams gold per tonne over 116 metres in hole 3. The style of mineralization suggested a gold-bearing porphyry, favourable for a large tonnage, open pit operation.

Subsequent drilling hit sporadic intervals of low-grade mineralization with some holes yielding bonanza grade gold values over 2 metres width. Since July, the junior punched 5 holes into the zone yielding up to 188 metres averaging 0.98-gram gold in hole 42.

Most of the high-grade intersections lie near the contact between the Silver King Porphyry and the Elise footwall volcanics with values occurring in either rock type. The highest gold grades came from hole 3 where a 1.23 metre returned 240 grams gold and hole 8, which yielded a 2 metre interval grading 172.1 grams gold. These holes were collared 125 metres apart covering a vertical depth of 40-to-190 metres.

So far, Sultan has identified seven promising target areas over the project. Previous exploration focussed on Gold Mountain and the Kena target, some 2-km to the south. The third target lies another 3-km to the south is marked by a large geochemical anomaly, dubbed South Gold. The other prospects are defined by historical working dating back to the early 1900’s and include the Great Western, Tough Nut, Starlight, Cariboo and Silver King Mine.

At Great Western, a gold-in-soil geochemical anomaly has been defined over a 1,200-by-300 metres area. Grab samples collected from old workings returned up to 119.3 grams gold, while chip samples in the intrusive returned up to 1.11-gram gold over 2 metres.

Samples collected from the Starlight target returned up to 22.5 grams gold over 1 metres. Previous drilling cut narrow high-grade section of 30.4 grams gold over 28 cm in hole 1 and 11 grams gold over 2 metres in hole 3.

Moving 4-km south of Gold Mountain, the South Gold zone has been marked by an 800-by-200 metre coincidental gold-in-soil and induced polarization geophysical anomalies. This will be the first drill target of the new program.