Orestone Mining samples Francisca Gold Project, Argentina
Orestone Mining Corp. [TSXV: ORS; OTC Pink: ORESF; FSE: O2R2] has completed a program of sampling on its Francisca property located in Salta Province, northwestern Argentina approximately 80 km northwest of the city of Salta. Orestone is targeting an oxide gold deposit mineable by open pit methods and amenable to heap leach gold recovery.
A total of 38 check samples were taken, 20 samples on the South gold zone and 18 on the North gold zone and other areas. The South gold zone is a strongly altered quartz stockwork outlined over a strike length of 500 metres and width of 50-100 metres.
Of the 20 samples taken on the South zone 11 were greater than 6.0 g/t gold and eight samples assayed between 0.36 and 4.5 g/t gold; 13 samples were taken on the North gold zone, a quartz manganese stockwork zone, values are from 0.01 to 21.7 g/t gold averaging 0.38 g/t gold excluding two high grade samples of 9.4 and 21.7 g/t gold.
The sampling confirms the high-grade nature of the South gold zone with 20 samples ranging in value from 0.03 to 33 g/t gold and 2.0 to 160 g/t silver, averaging 5.78 g/t gold and 29.2 g/t silver (gold grades cut to 10 g/t and silver grades cut to 60 g/t).
David Hottman, CEO, stated: “The Francisca property covers a robust gold system discovered during a period of historically very low gold prices, which has seen no meaningful work conducted on it for almost 20 years. Results of the current sampling program correlates well with data from the historic work. Our goal is to define an oxide gold deposit that can be mined by open pit and would be amenable to low-cost heap leach gold recovery methods. Additional information regarding exploration plans will be released in the near future.”
Previous sampling over the South zone noted in historic summary reports averaged, 5.69 g/t gold from 46 samples (high grade results cut to 10 g/t gold). Of these, 28 samples ranged from 3.0 to 109 g/t gold and 13 samples graded from 0.11 to 2.19 g/t gold.
Orestone does not have the detailed assay data of the historic trenches or drilling as only summary data and maps of the higher-grade intervals encountered are available. The observations of gold assay values in the trenches are non-43-101 compliant due to their historic nature but the detailed geological mapping and exploration programs were done by competent professional geologists and indicate the presence of a significant, disseminated gold stock-work system that was only poorly tested by diamond core drilling.
Geologic mapping has outlined an oxide gold stock-work mineralized trend over a northwest strike length of 1100 metres outcropping on the crest of a moderate relief hill. The zones are surrounded by a 500 to 1,000-metre wide area of strongly hornfels altered sediments and underlain by a large IP changeability anomaly indicating potential for a larger intrusive body at depth. The oxide gold quartz limonite stock-work trend is associated with quartz feldspar porphyry intrusive dykes and intense sericite alteration along NW trending faults.
Orestone Mining’s property portfolio includes exploration exposure to gold, silver and copper in Canada and Argentina. Orestone’s near term objective on the Francisca gold property is to define an oxide gold deposit mineable by open pit methods using low-cost heap leach gold recovery. The company’s primary asset continues to be the 100%-owned Captain gold-copper project in North Central BC which hosts a large gold dominate porphyry system; permitted and drill ready. The optioned Las Burras property provides large scale copper exposure to the company. All three projects are road accessible and suitable for year-round exploration.