www.steliasmines.com
The principal business of St. Elias Mines Ltd. is the acquisition, exploration, development and sale of high potential mineral properties in the most prolific regions of the world. At present, the Company is focusing its exploration efforts on gold in Peru with three gold properties (Tesoro, Vilcoro and Cueva Blanca.)
St. Elias Mines hits 0.74 g/t gold over 37.85 metres at Tesoro
St. Elias Mines (CVE:SLI) unveiled Tuesday further details on drill results announced earlier this month, as well as on the ongoing drill program at the Tesoro gold property in southwestern Peru.
The previously announced assay results were initial results from 11 diamond drill holes, or 4,375 metres of a planned 5,500-metre phase IA drill program at the project.
Drilling is testing high-priority targets identified by a 2009/2010 Titan 24 geophysical survey at Tesoro.
The company said summary drilling results will be announced once the phase IA program is completed, and the compilation and interpretation of all data is finished.
To date, drilling has focused on the anomaly at Zone Central, where drill hole TE-11-06 returned "compelling initial results".
While additional drill testing is required, the company is in the process of completely sampling the hole from 60 metres to 170 metres on minimum 1.5-metre intervals to more accurately define a potential, bulk-tonnage mineralized target, it said.
The interval from 90.6 metres to 128.5 metres in hole TE-11-06 assayed 0.74 grams per tonne (g/t) gold over 37.85 metres, and includes 0.74 metres of 23.5g/t gold at 112.26 metres and 0.35 metres of 9.6g/t gold at 113.32 metres.
St. Elias said these mineralized intersections have led the company to fine tune additional exploration targets for drilling.
The Quantec survey data is currently being re-evaluated and re-interpreted to take into account the latest drill results, in correlation with the geophysical targets, the company added.
The gold miner also said that several sampled intervals from drilling contained sulphide mineralization, which so far indicates a correlation between these visible sulphides and gold mineralization.
The company is in the middle of a re-sampling and drill core analysis program, with a focus on increasing the sampling intervals both above and below any noted quartz or sulphide intersections. Where areas of multiple sulphide mineralization was noted, continuous sampling through these zones to combine one single sampled interval will be completed.
"While it is still early days for our flagship project, we are very excited as initial drilling at Tesoro has confirmed gold mineralization at depth," said president Lori McClenahan.
"We are using logical and systematic exploration steps and techniques to guide us in our exploration efforts. Much more exploration/drilling is warranted at the Tesoro. This is just the beginning."
The second drill rig is onsite and turning, which is expected to result in quicker turnaround time for geological information and analyses.
The Tesoro property is 100 percent-owned by the company, with no underlying royalties.
The project covers approximately 6,974 hectares and is part of the prolific 300 kilometre by 30 kilometre Nazca-Ocoña gold belt parallel to the Pacific coast of southwestern Peru.
While veins tend to be narrow, the grade is significant and the mineralized structures tend to extend along strike for several kilometres and to depths of up to 1,000 metres, St. Elias said.
To date, the miner has identified five mineralized zones with more than 50 quartz veins, having a total combined length of nine kilometres at Tesoro. It has carried out underground exploration and development work on three of these veins.
The Tesoro property has never been tested to depth or to its full strike potential, leaving St. Elias potential for the discovery of additional mineralization.
