High-grade copper, gold results bolster Mars

PolarX Ltd. Nov. 19 said strong assay results from soil and rock‐chip sampling demonstrate the potential for a significant gold‐copper discovery at the Mars prospect on its Alaska Range project.

The Mars prospect is located at the northwest end of a 7.5-mile- (12 kilometers) long structural corridor that extends through the Zackly Skarn deposit and onto the Zackly SE porphyry prospect on the east end.

Infill soil and rock chip sampling carried out this year has confirmed a 2,000- by 1,500-meter area of anomalous copper, gold, molybdenum and arsenic mineralization previously identified with broadly spaced sampling at Mars.

This surface geochemical anomaly, coupled with an induced polarization (IP) geophysical anomaly identified 100 to 150 meters below the surface of Mars, provides intriguing evidence of another potential porphyry copper-gold system.

Geologists collected 201 soil samples this year at Mars.

This sampling returned greater than 50 parts per billion gold and 50 parts per million arsenic over the previously identified geochemical anomaly. The highest grade samples collected this year at Mars graded 556 ppb gold and 1,230 ppm arsenic.

Within this larger soil anomaly, this year's sampling outlined a 1,400- by 800-meter with copper values topping 250 ppm and greater than 5 ppm molybdenum in soils. Peak values were 1,775 ppm for copper and 24.2 ppm for molybdenum.

PolarX said the copper and molybdenum anomalies coincide with the previously identified IP anomaly.

In turn, these soil and IP anomalies are spatially related to a number of intrusive centers indicated by a high‐resolution aeromagnetic survey reported by PolarX earlier this month.

"These results provide several pieces of key evidence which, when combined, strongly support our view that Mars is an exceptional, high‐priority target," said PolarX Managing Director Frazer Tabeart. "They show that multi‐element anomalism in soil and rock‐chip geochemistry is spatially coincident with an IP anomaly and an interpreted intrusive cluster."

High-grade copper and gold assays from this year's rock-chip sampling – including one sample that exceeded 50 percent copper, the limits of the analytical method used, and another at 24.3 percent copper – are adding to the excitement for Mars.

In addition, assays from the 52 rock chip samples collected this year returned 7.44, 4.49, 4.45 and 1.65 percent copper; and 6.93, 2.94, 2.41 and 1.78 g/t gold. All these samples were collected on the northern edge of the soil anomaly closest to the intersection of a terrane bounding fault, west-northwest structure and the intrusive cluster indicated by the magnetic geophysical survey.

"Mars is a very high priority, drill‐ready target for large porphyry copper‐gold style mineralization," said Tabeart.

–SHANE LASLEY