Greenstone/Dragoon take up search for base metals in B.C.

For decades now, companies have drilled holes, often to great depths, into the Aldridge formation near Cranbrook, B.C., in the search for a major massive sulphide deposit.

The most recent effort was undertaken by Goldpac Investments (VSE), which drilled a single hole to a depth of 6,888 ft (400 ft into the lower Aldridge formation) on its Bar property. The company believed the property had the right geological and geophysical framework to host a deposit in the magnitude of the nearby Sullivan lead-zinc-silver orebody which has been mined for over 79 years by Cominco Ltd. (VSE). Although the hole intersected 150 ft of sulphide clast, it did not cut any ore grade intersections.

Now the joint venture team of Toronto-based Greenstone Resources (TSE) and Vancouver-based Dragoon Resources (VSE) have picked up the torch on a property located about four miles southwest of the Bar property. For Greenstone, which will be earning 50% of the project, it’s part of a diversification program to increase exposure to base metals.

Dragoon is the operator of the exploration program to be conducted on the lead-zinc-silver-gold prospect. The technical team consists of Michael Bapty, a former Cominco mining engineer, Eric MacDonald, a former senior geologist with Cominco at the Sullivan mine, and a local independent consulting geologist, Peter Klewchuk, who has 10 years’ experience with Cominco.

Dragoon describes the 13.9 sq-mi McNeil property as underlain by the middle and lower portions of the Aldridge formation which, at the contact between the two, typically hosts a build-up of sulphides. The company notes that unlike other prospects in the area, this contact on the McNeil is relatively close to surface as defined by several characteristic structural markers, making the target easier and less expensive to explore.

The team has outlined four targets. The first is a series of six shear zones individually ranging up to 16 ft wide x 1,000 ft long. The shears are reported to have surface showings of lead, silver and gold, with massive boulders of galena recovered from trenches. The second target is a large (7,500 ft long x 600 ft wide) anomaly identified by lead, zinc and silver geochemical sampling. Dragoon thinks this surface expression may have been remobilized from a deep seated concentration of sulphides; thus its target is a possible pooled deposit trapped beneath a gabbro sill which is associated with the anomaly.

The third target is another series of geochemical anomalies lower in stratigraphy, which the team believes may represent leakage from a Sullivan-type massive lead-zinc- silver deposit at the lower-middle Aldridge contact, thought to be within 750 ft of surface.

Ian Park, president of Greenstone, says the team is not drilling a theory based on geophysics. “Rather, we are drilling a tightly co-ordinated series of geochemical, geological and structural signatures whose best explanation is a significant metal deposit,” he said.

The fourth target is an area containing surface gold values which coincides with a magnetic anomaly about 1,000 ft long x 160 ft wide. The company said the anomaly appears to relate to felsic intrusives which typically have consistent gold values in the district.

Drilling is now under way on the shear zones, and a second series of holes will test the gold target, followed by the lower-middle Aldridge contact. The company expects to be releasing results over the next several months.