Skeena pleased that Snip results confirm historical data
The 440 portal at the Snip Mine in the Golden Triangle of northwest British Columbia. Source: Skeena Resources Ltd.
Skeena Resources Ltd. [SKE-TSXV] has released more impressive results from underground drilling at the company’s flagship Snip gold project located in northwest British Columbia’s fabled Golden Triangle. The 2017 underground drill program wrapped up on December 16, with a total of 8,650 metres drilled over 62 holes. Assays are still pending for 34 holes.
Highlights from the latest batch of drill holes included UG17-040, which targeted the Twin Zone area and intersected 50.21 grams gold over 2.0 metres.
The company said drill hole UG17-030, located 40 metres up dip, intersected 12.84 g/t gold over 2.90 metres.
Section 4930E was drilled with four fanned drill holes to confirm the historical drilling in the newly defined 412 Zone. The company said the 412 Zone appears to be a series of parallel, high-grade shears located in the footwall below the Twin Zone and 150 Veins in an area with no record of previous mining.
Highlights include drill hole UG17-018, which intersected 22.01 g/t gold over 1.90 metres as well as 7.99 g/t gold over 3.00 metres.
“We are delighted by the drill results to date from Snip as we continue to see grades and widths that are consistent with historical results,” said Skeena CEO Walter Coles.
“The most recent drill results from the 412 Zone area are particularly exciting as this area was never mined and we’ve been able to expand the mineralized zone,” he said. “Once all results from the 2017 underground drill program have been received, we will announce detailed plans for further underground drilling and surface drilling in 2018.”
In March, 2016, Skeena secured an option to acquire a 100% interest in the former Snip gold mine from Barrick Gold Corp. [ABX-TSX, ABX-NYSE]. Snip is a high grade mine that produced approximately one million ounces of gold from 1991 to 1999, at an average gold grade of 25 grams per tonne at a 12 g/t gold reserve cut off.
After spending $3 million and reviewing over 280,000 metres of historical surface and underground drill assays, the company launched the underground drill program to focus on potential new production areas near existing underground developments.
At the same time, the company said it planned to target numerous mineralized footwall structures that were not included in the historical Snip mineral resource. “Drilling is intended to confirm gold mineralization left behind by the previous operator in the Twin Zone and footwall vein structures, including the 150 and 130 veins, the 412 Zone and the 200 Footwall Zone.” The Twin Zone accounted for 61% of the historical production.
On Tuesday January 9, 2018 Skeen shares eased 1.43% or $0.01 to 69 cents.
The shares were also active on December 12, 2017 when Skeena announced results from the first 17 holes of the underground program. It said those results had verified the historical data in the Twin Zone and 150 Vein by successfully supporting the anticipated geology and mineralization models. Underground drill hole UG17-013, for example, returned 341.00 g/t gold over 1.5 metres, the company said in a press release.