Miramar cuts bonanza grades at depth (June 09, 2003)

Vancouver — Miramar Mining (Mae-T) is buoyed by the initial results from a program aimed at testing the depth potential of the Boston deposit on the Hope Bay gold project in Nunavut.

Gold-mineralized intersections from an ongoing 9,000-metre drilling program have returned up to 54.7 grams gold per tonne over 9 metres.

“The results have greatly exceeded our expectations,” says Miramar’s president, Tony Walsh. “Not only has the deep drilling at Boston indicated that there is potential to extend the Boston mineralization to depths of over 1,000 metres, but the scale and intensity of alteration, the presence of quartz veining with abundant visible gold and high grades demonstrates the huge potential of the Boston deposit.”

To date, the Boston mineralizing system marks the largest gold resource in the Hope Bay belt with a measured and indicated resource of some 1.4 million tonnes grading 15 grams gold per tonne.

Previous reconnaissance drilling by BHP, now BHP Billiton (BHP-N) shows that gold mineralization continues to depths of at least 600 metres below surface.

(Archean shear-hosted gold deposits often extend to depths of 2-to-3 km and so far the Boston system has only been systematically explored to depths of 350 metres. Miramar aims to test the zone to depths of at least 1-km below surface.)

The first two deep holes intersected zones of alteration and quartz veining, which seem to correlate with both the B2 and B3 zones, and extended the alteration zones. With only partial assay results available, hole 290W tested the northern part of the deposit to a depth of 1.2 km and returned 13.7 grams gold over 0.7 metre, while hole 293 tested the central part of the deposit cutting 9 metres grading 54.7 grams gold some 850 metres below surface. Included in this interval was a bonanza-grade section running 129.5 grams gold over 2.9 metres.

Based on the preliminary results, Miramar believes that it has confirmed that Boston-style alteration continues to depths below 1 km and that the alteration hosts gold mineralization analogous to that seen in the B2, B3 and B4 zones in the upper parts of the Boston system.

Miramar is currently drilling 400 metres south of hole 293.

At last count, the Hope Bay project held measured and indicated resources of 3.36 million tonnes grading 15.4 grams gold, plus an inferred 6.7 million tonnes grading 12.3 grams gold.

In January, an independent scoping study on the Doris area alone concluded that the high-grade Hinge zone can support a stand-alone operation with a capital investment of $26.7 million. A stockpile of 9,000 tonnes of Boston material would expand the Hinge zone resource to the tune of 471,600 tonnes averaging 18.5 grams gold.