A legal battle to secure title to a portion of the Las Cristinas gold deposit has not slowed the pace of exploration being carried out by Crystallex International (KRY-T) at its properties in Venezuela’s Kilometre 88 district.
Crystallex is awaiting the decision of the Supreme Court with regard to the Cristinas 4 and 6 concessions. The properties cover a portion of Las Cristinas, which is being developed by Placer Dome (PDG-T). The junior is seeking to overturn the ruling of a government agency that granted title to these concessions to Placer Dome, rather than to a Venezuelan company now held by Crystallex.
In the meantime, Crystallex continues to mine gold at its Albino property, adjacent to Las Cristinas. Production through September exceeded 8,000 oz.
(with 7,031 oz. of bullion sold), compared with 4,500 oz. in 1996. The project is expected to have turned out 12,000 oz. by year-end.
Daily mill throughput in September averaged 367 tons, compared with the 1996 average of 93 tons per day. Daily production of ore and waste exceeded 3,000 tons, compared with 800 tons per day in 1996. The company says the increased stripping includes pre-stripping of a newly identified pit connecting the Conductora pit and the Aguao 2 pit. The new pit will provide saprolite (oxidized) feed to the mill during 1998, pending development of the higher-grade, hard-rock mine.
Exploration of the Albino 1 concession is ongoing. Recent work included 2,630 metres of drilling in 13 holes to test for the down-plunge and lateral continuity of the Conductora-Aguao 2 shear system. Shear-hosted mineralization was intercepted in all the holes. Some of the better results included 10 grams gold per tonne over 2.64 metres and 4.06 grams gold over 7.07 metres.
The deep drilling program was followed by 600 metres of shallow drilling aimed at increasing saprolite reserves between the Conductora and Aguao pits.
Results include 6.75 metres grading 13.7 grams gold. The work established the presence of saprolite mineralization across the length of the Aguao-La Conductora shear, and led to a decision to expand open-pit operations at Albino.
Trenching was carried out to investigate gold-in-soil anomalies southwest of known mineralization at Albino. Results include 18 metres of 2.85 grams, 10.5 metres of 1.79 grams, 11.6 metres of 2.9 grams and 7.5 metres of 3.09 grams.
A 3,000-metre, third-phase round of drilling is planned for the Albino property, as well as mechanized trenching along the entire length of the concession. The first 1,300 metres will test shallow targets near the Conductora-Aguao 2 pit, the goal being to expand minable, saprolite reserves.
The remaining 1,700 metres will investigate drill targets generated by trenching.
Crystallex also is exploring the 9,600-ha Mineiro property where a previous operator outlined a small gold resource. This year’s program is aimed at testing other know targets. The company also is gearing up to carry out some reconnaissance exploration to test other prospects in the Kilometre 88 region.
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