Expatriate, Nordac among most promising Yukon explorers

Exploration activity in most parts of Canada has plummeted in recent years, and the Yukon is no exception. Nonetheless, there are still a few brave hearts with staying power, and they’re managing to fund several projects with significant potential.

Most of the juniors active in the Yukon have a familiarity with the region, which stands in contrast to the quick-flip mentality that, for decades, has plagued Canada’s junior exploration sector. “Better the devil you know, than the devil you don’t” appears to be the modus operandi of the today’s Yukon explorers.

Expatriate Resources (EXR-V), headed by Harlan Meade, resumed drilling on its WOL and Goal Net properties in the Finlayson district earlier this year. The WOL property hosts the downdip extension of the Wolverine deposit, whose high selenium content has complicated its development. Expatriate has the right to acquire a 60% interest in Wolverine from Boliden Westmin. The latter, a subsidiary of Boliden (bol-t), will eventually own about 53% of Expatriate by way of a share consideration.

Expatriate is integrating metallurgical test results, smelter responses and various engineering studies into a prefeasibility study that will consider the viability of developing Wolverine jointly with the nearby Kudz Ze Kayah deposit, which it holds under an agreement with Cominco (CLT-T).

The first drill hole, completed on Expatriate’s WOL claims in June, intersected a 7.4-metre true thickness of massive sulphides grading 13.56% zinc, 1.16% lead and 0.68% copper, plus 152 grams silver and 0.59 gram gold per tonne. The massive sulphide mineralization was intersected 100 metres downdip of the nearest holes on the Wolverine deposit, across the claim boundary on the Wolverine joint-venture property.

On the company’s wholly owned Goal Net property, in the Kudz Ze Kayah part of the district, drill hole 2 intersected semi-massive-sulphide mineralization, including one 0.73-metre section assaying 3% zinc, 1.85% lead, 0.14% copper, 63 grams silver and 0.2 gram gold. The host strata are geologically similar to the strata that host the GP4F deposit, 6 km to the north, says Expatriate. A shallow, weak conductor, several hundred metres to the southeast, remains to be tested. Like the GP4F deposit, the base and precious metal mineralization at Goal Net is characterized by low levels of selenium.

Expatriate and Nordac Resources (NRQ-V) are 50-50 joint-venture partners on the Armenius and Eureka properties, in the southern part of the Klondike Goldfields. It is estimated that creeks draining this property have already produced more than 140,000 oz. of placer gold.

Recent exploration has focused on grid soil-sampling within the headwaters of Eureka Creek, where, in late 1999, encouraging results were obtained from reconnaissance soil sampling and prospecting. Some of the highest values coincide with three areas where gold-bearing float has been discovered. Gold values of up to 15 grams were reported from breccia specimens at the Allen Showing last year. Similar samples of float material recently collected at the same site exhibited excellent reproducibility, yielding 14.42 grams gold. The source of the float has not yet been discovered.

Additional close-spaced soil sampling and excavator trenching are proposed for next spring, the objective being to establish the continuity of the auriferous structural corridor in the target area and determine the grade and extent of gold-bearing zones.

Nordac’s Burwash property, in the Watson Lake area, hosts disseminated nickel/copper/platinum group metal mineralization associated with a Triassic ultramafic sill. Specimens of rusty weathering float from the main eochemical anomaly have assayed up to 0.63% nickel, 0.82% copper, 0.89 gram platinum and 1.63 grams palladium. In addition, chip samples taken from a hand trench within the smaller soil anomaly, averaged 0.12% nickel, 0.48% copper, 1.1 grams platinum and 0.66 gram palladium across 11 metres. Although the geological setting resembles that of the former Wellgreen mine, 8 km to the west, the target has never been drilled or trenched — something that remains a priority for the company.

Blue Heaven

Disappointing results were reported this year by Nordac from a 4-hole diamond drill program on its QB and Blue Heaven properties in the Rancheria area of the southern Yukon. All of the holes further explored carbonate replacement-type silver-zinc-lead targets, where previous trenching and/or drilling had returned encouraging results. No further work is planned for the property at this time, the company notes.

Eagle Plains Resources (epl-v) has been exploring two of its wholly owned properties in the Pelly Mountains in south-central Yukon, about 30 km south of Ross River. Volcanogenic massive sulphide polymetallic (gold-silver-copper-lead-zinc) mineralization was targeted on the St. Cyr, Fire and Ice properties in a drill program that was completed in August.

Although no significant mineralization was encountered on the St. Cyr property, on the Fire and nearby Ice properties, five of six holes intersected thick barite material containing variable amounts of silver-lead-zinc mineralization. The best-mineralized interval within the barite was found on the Ice property, from 56.7 to 58 metres, which returned 5.64% zinc, 0.17% lead and 12.3 grams silver.

Eagle Plains’ McQuesten gold claims are under option to NovaGold Resources (nri-t) and the exploration subsidiary of Newmont Mining (NEM-N), while its Rusty Springs base metal project is under option to CanAustra Resources (CTA-V). Eagle Plains is also active in the Yukon’s Tintina gold belt, where it holds a 100% interest in four intrusive-related gold properties.

Since August 1999, Barramundi Gold (BAM-V) and Newmont Exploration of Canada have spent more than $1 million on the Longline property, 140 km southwest of Dawson City. Newmont recently dropped out of the joint venture, and Barramundi is now seeking a replacement partner.

Two veins containing visible gold were encountered in a drill program earlier this year. The uppermost vein assayed 2.21 grams gold over 0.2 metre, while the lower vein returned 5.36 grams over 0.31 metre. Also intersected were several narrow zones of anomalous gold-bearing sulphide veins with associated strong sericite alteration. The mineralization exists in shallow-dipping quartz veins containing arsenopyrite, galena, stibnite and native gold.

Based on all geological, geophysical and geochemical data accumulated to date, Barramundi is preparing a conceptual model outlining the potential for deeper targets in this highly prospective corridor of the 141 Zone.

Barramundi has also been looking at a contract mining program for the Swede’s Pit vein, on the Longline property, which is permitted for mining and hosts about 20,000 gravity-extractable ounces of gold.

Weak offshore markets and low electrical demand have temporarily halted Cash Resources‘ (KSH-V) search for coal deposits in the Yukon. (The company’s game plan was to discover sufficient thermal coal reserves to support a coal-fired generating plant.) Instead, Cash has shifted its focus to gold and base metals. Nonetheless, the company has had to struggle to raise money for its portfolio of Yukon properties, owing to depressed market conditions.

Highland Gold

One of the company’s projects, the Highland Gold property, is the subject of a joint-venture agreement with Nordac Resources and Expatriate. Situated in the Tintina belt, 70 km northeast of Watson Lake, the Highland property hosts extensive gold-arsenic-bismuth soil geochemical anomalies.

Rotary percussion drill holes have produced significant results, including intersections of 3 grams gold over 16.7 metres and 1.1 grams gold over 142 metres. Under the joint-venture agreement, Expatriate must fund all the cost of compiling data and marketing properties to potential optionees.

The company’s wholly owned Mucho property, 315 km northeast of Whitehorse, is under option to Vancouver-based Panoro Resources. The claims cover silver-lead-zinc-copper-gold mineralization occurring as veins, fracture fillings, disseminations and massive sulphide replacement bodies. Several previously unrecognized veins were discovered on the property last year, and some of these are are exposed intermittently over strike lengths exceeding 1,000 metres.

Chip sampling from widely separated outcrops and hand pits returned encouraging assays, including:

421 grams silver, 6.8% lead and 0.6% zinc across 130 cm;

712 grams silver, 1.5% lead and 2.1% zinc across 30 cm; and

279 grams silver, 2.4% lead and 0.1% zinc across 80 cm.

Fairfield Minerals (FFD-T), which has a long and illustrious history in the Yukon, recently optioned its RAM property to privately owned Ross River Gold under terms whereby Ross River can earn a 70% interest in the property for 220,000 shares and $500,000 in work commitments.

Cabin Lake

Among Fairfield’s assets in the Yukon is the Cabin Lake property, 170 km west of Watson Lake. It hosts pyrite, chalcopyrite and minor sulphide minerals as disseminations to semi-massive bands on the central and western claims. The sulphide minerals appear to be stratabound and may represent re-mobilized and metamorphosed stratiform syngenetic-type mineralization similar to important polymetallic deposits recently discovered in the Finlayson Lake area, about 160 km northeast of Cabin Lake.

Fairfield’s 40%-owned Logan property, 108 km northwest of Watson Lake, contains an indicated resource of 13.5 million tons grading 6.17% zinc and 0.77 oz. silver per ton. All of these reserves are contained in a northeast-trending, fault-related structure. Fairfield wants to sell or option its interest in the Logan claim group, and prior exploration data have been reviewed by interested parties.

The company’s 52-claim MOR property is 9 km north of the Alaska Highway, in the Morley River area. It was last under option to Brett Resources (BRN-V), which, in 1999, spent $47,400 on soil sampling and mapping. The soil grid started by Brett on the southern claims will be completed at a later date on a minimum of 200 metres of line spacing, while the new northern claims will also be sampled, at a 200-metre line spacing, for a total of 660 samples. The main geochemical trend will be auger-sampled to outline trench and drill targets. In addition, a 52-line-km ground magnetometer/very-low-frequency electromagnetic survey will be carried out to cover the claims not surveyed to date. Work will be carried out from a temporary fly camp in the central property area, says Fairfield.