Regarding the article “Band-Ore takes up new gold prospect,” (T.N.M., Feb. 8-14/99), why would The Northern Miner allow a junior company such as Band-Ore to release such unjustified results? I am referring to the “grab samples with grades between 1.2 and 1,878 grams gold per tonne.” Such obvious self-promotion of a junior is clearly unwarranted and misrepresentative of the facts.
Perhaps The Northern Miner publishes any grade that a company releases without questioning the motive. The readers, however, can see through this obvious self-promotion. No self-respecting geologist would allow an anomalous grade of 1,878 grams per tonne to be published. I have to ask myself if Band-Ore employs any geologists. How could this uncut grade get to press? In an industry trying to recover from the damage of the Bre-X fiasco, why does The Northern Miner allow such absurd values to appear within the walls of its influence?
I am disappointed that such reckless reporting of mineral values still appears in the press, and ask you to be more stringent when reporting such preliminary values. Promoting such unreproducible results gives Band-Ore, The Northern Miner and the whole industry a black eye.
John Korczak
Earth Sciences Student
University of Waterloo
Editor’s Note:
The Northern Miner has no authority to regulate what information a company may release, but it does investigate such releases for their legitimacy and newsworthiness. Furthermore, geologists must report all material facts — whether they respect themselves or not.
These grades were from grab samples, a sample type that is representative only of the material put in the sample bag, not of the outcrop it came from; and our report correctly identified them as such.
Cutting assays has no theoretical basis in statistics, and cutting assays from grab samples is neither statistically nor geologically defensible: the normal practice is to use the grades of grab samples only as an indication that the rock is mineralized, not as a measure of the potential metal content of a rock. Reporting uncut assays from grab samples (as long as they are correctly identified as such) is neither reckless nor promotional in our view.
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