Vancouver – Additional drill results from Skeena Resources‘ (SKE-V, SKREF-O) El Corazon gold project in northwestern Ecuador delivered some higher grades over a previous batch of assays that prompted a slide in the company’s share price.
A recent trio of holes on the breccia-hosted target returned up to 5 metres (from 210 metres downhole depth) grading 17.88 grams gold per tonne in SKE-040 including a 1.44-metre section of core averaging 61.4 grams gold. The offset hole tested about 80 metres vertically beneath and on-section with last year’s SKE-019 that cut 16.9 metres of 36.2 grams gold.
Skeena has demobilized the drill rig from the project with assays pending for the final four holes.
The company has reviewed a down-dip continuity of over 850 metres in the breccia unit and more than 200 metres of lateral extent with an average thickness of 20-to-30 metres.
Epithermal gold mineralization at the project occurs in an andesitic volcanic sequence intruded by an explosive rhyolite breccia. The silicified breccia exhibits stockwork quartz veining and is typically highly enriched in gold with lesser grades in the peripheral andesites.
El Corazon was initially acquired by Rio Tinto (RTP-N) in 1995 following a government geochemical survey. The major subsequently drilled the property returning broad intervals of 1-to-2 grams gold over widths of up to 90 metres. Other companies drilled in the late-1990s, intersecting high-grade values of up to 49 grams gold across 23.7 metres, but the property was dropped due to market conditions.
Skeena acquired its option in mid-2003 from private Ecuadorian company AgroIndustrial, comprised of ex-Rio Tinto personnel, which now operates a small-scale underground mine on the project targeting the previously identified high-grade material. AgroIndustrial plans to increase its operating rate to about 50-tonnes-per-day.
Skeena’s shares rallied from about 39 up to the 55-level leading into the results but then pulled back to the 40-range on strong trading volume.
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