Prospecting finds new targets at Cuiu Cuiu

The heyday at northern Brazil’s Cuiú Cuiú gold district spanned 1972-1992 when 5,000-10,000 garimpeiros collected in this corner of Para state to work the rich alluvial deposits draining into the Tapajós River.

From the mid- to late-1990s several major mining companies and a handful of juniors all carried out work there including Phelps Dodge and Altoro Resources, but according to Magellan Minerals (MNM-V, MAGNF-O), many of them failed to reach satisfactory agreements with the majority of the local miners and their interest waned further when the gold price started to fall in 1997-98.

Magellan Minerals stepped in and acquired exploration rights to the area in 2004 and reached an agreement the following year with the owners of the traditional surface rights. Since then the company has defined a resource estimate for the Cuiú Cuiú project, made up of the Central and Moreira Gomes zones, of 3.4 million tonnes grading 1.0 gram gold per tonne for 100,000 ounces of contained gold in the indicated category and 31 million tonnes grading 1.2 grams gold per tonne for 1.2 million ounces of contained gold of the inferred. About 51% of the gold is contained within the Moreira Gomes deposit and 49% within the Central deposit and both remain open along strike and at depth.

Recent prospecting and the discovery of four new high-grade and untested gold showings in the vicinity of the Moreira Gomes deposit confirm the potential for adding significant high-grade resources at Cuiu Cuiu in the short term, the company says.

A grab sample from the previously unknown Quebrabunda showing, about 1 km north of the Moreira Gomes deposit, returned 203.5 grams gold per tonne. And linear one-metre chip samples from the previously unknown 6 Irmaos zone, between 180 metres and 330 metres south of the Moreira Gomes deposit,  returned between 46.4 and 128.6 grams gold per tonne.

In addition, 500 metres to the north of Moreira Gomes and 300 metres northeast of the Machiche showing in the previously unrecognized Cuiabana zone, grab samples returned between 7 grams gold and 14.9 grams gold. (Machiche has been tested by one drill hole and returned an intercept of 3.3 metres grading 7.4 grams gold.) Finally, 800 metres to the north of Moreira Gomes and 900 metres east of the Jerimum de Baixo zone, a grab sample returned 10.9 grams gold.

At least 20 high-grade structures have been identified within the Cuiu Cuiu area to date.

According to Magellan the identification of the 6 Irmaos zone is perhaps the most significant discovery so far this year. Four samples from two separate structures returned values of 46.4 grams gold, 55.0 grams gold, 122.2 grams gold and 128.6 grams gold.  These results follow previous sampling from two other structures in the same area that returned 17.0 grams gold and 2.2 grams gold. Hole 104 was previously drilled 250 metres east of the current samples and intersected 7.5 metres of 18.8 grams gold.

So far Magellan has identified four distinct mineralized zones at Cuiu Cuiu that it anticipates are amenable to open-pit mining. These include Central, Central North, Moreira Gomes and Jerimum Baixo.

Since releasing an initial resource estimate based on 25,957 metres of drilling in the Central and Moreira Gomes deposits, a further 20,849 metres of exploration and step-out drilling has been completed.  

The Cuiú Cuiú district is 180 km southwest of the small city of Itaituba, the regional hub for the Tapajós mineral province in Brazil. Itaituba is about midway between Belém and Manaus, both of which are cities with populations of about 2 million people on the Amazon River. Access to the property is by small plane from Itaituba or by boat along the Tapajós and Crepori Rivers.

Magellan estimates that historic gold production in the Cuiú Cuiú district was in the order of 1.5 million ounces to 2 million ounces and more than 95% of it was from alluvial and near-surface saprolitic and lateritic material over an 11 km X 7 km area.

Today Magellan’s property holdings cover the entire district, the company states on its website, and consist of two exploration licenses, four license applications and seventy-six artisanal mining claims that together total more than 470 sq. km.

The mineralized structure stretches for more than seventeen kilometers from southeast to northwest across Magellan’s license area and its exploration work has identified five major gold soil anomalies as well as several minor anomalies along this zone.

In addition to the Cuiu Cuiu project, Magellan is developing its Coringa project, also in the Tapagos region. Coringa has measured and indicated resources of 3.2 million tonnes grading 5.5 grams gold for 561,000 ounces of contained gold and inferred resources of 5.5 million tonnes at 3.0 grams gold for 534,000 ounces of contained gold.

At presstime in Toronto Magellan was trading at 35¢ per share within a 52-week trading range of 34-$1.50. The junior has about 110 million shares fully diluted.