A story in last week’s issue implied that these were all grass- roots projects. “Not so,” says Agnico’s Paul Penna who points out that a number of these are in various stages of advanced exploration and/or development.
On its Leroy Lake silver project in the Gowganda area embracing both the former Castlebar Silver and Cobalt Mines and Silverbar Mines, for instance, the underground workings are to be pumped out with lateral work and extensive underground drilling planned.
Another of its properties, on the east arm of Great Slave Lake in the Northwest Territories, is described as an advanced grassroots silver- gold-uranium-platinum project. Detailed sampling of known radioactive and sulphide occurrences was carried out last year at a cost of $157,000 following which three separate claim groups were staked. Considerably more will be spent there this year.
Included in the Hecla assemblage in the U.S. is the Gold Hunter mine in the Coeur d’Alene district, a former silver-lead-zinc producer that yielded more than 3,000,000 tons of ore averaging 3.9 oz silver, 3.8% lead and 0.5% zinc. A research program is proposed for this project to design and evaluate several methods of bulk mining through the development of a pilot stope calling for a $1-million expenditure
Also highly regarded in the Hecla fold is the Muldoon project in Blaine Cty., Idaho, consisting of 2,250 acres of leased and Hecla- owned unpatented claims. Work carried out by Hecla last year indicates a high potential for discovery of a major silver-base metals deposit, with an inferred target of 20 million tons plus grading 2.5 oz silver and 3% lead-zinc, amenable to open pit mining. A $600,000 initial phase diamond drill program is proposed for this year to verify continuity and tenor of the extensive mineralization exposed on surface.
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