Millrock raises West Pogo exploration funds

Millrock Resources Inc. July 29 announced that it has raised C$1 million to help fund exploration of its West Pogo gold project in the Goodpaster Mining District, as well as generate new properties and seek out partners to fund further exploration in Alaska.

As a project generating mineral exploration company, Millrock has long been bullish on the potential of the Goodpaster, a gold mining district about 100 miles east of Fairbanks that hosts Northern Star Resource Ltd.'s Pogo high-grade underground gold mine. With the conviction that Goodpaster has district-scale potential, Millrock has pulled together a large portfolio of mining claims covering some of the most prospective gold exploration ground around the Pogo property.

Millrock's growing Goodpaster portfolio includes West Pogo, a block of claims the project generator acquired in 2015 that demonstrates geological, geochemical and geophysical evidence of covering western extensions of an exciting gold discovery on Northern Star's property.

This first hole to tap this discovery, known as Goodpaster, cut 6.9 meters averaging 3.2 g/t per ton gold. A second hole drilled in 2017 cut 5.3 meters averaging 54.1 g/t gold.

Northern Star has built an exploration road to this area and is carrying out drilling near the boundary of the West Pogo claims.

A geophysical technique known as CSAMT (controlled-source audio-frequency magnetotellurics) was proven to be a useful tool in identifying the buried structures that commonly host gold veins at Pogo, including the veins tapped at the Goodpaster discovery.

Some of the money Millrock raised in its financing will be used to carry out a CSAMT survey at West Pogo.

"We intend to use a portion of the proceeds to advance exploration at our West Pogo gold project in Alaska. A specialized geophysical survey called CSAMT will be part of the work. The method has reportedly worked very well at discovering gold orebodies on the adjacent Pogo Gold Mine property that is operated by Northern Star Resources Ltd.," said Millrock Resources President and CEO Greg Beischer. "Additionally, Millrock intends to generate more high-quality gold projects in Alaska. We feel now is the time to act on the various targets that we've been waiting to acquire."

Millrock has allotted 30 percent of the funds raised during this initial tranche of its financing (C$300,000) to advance exploration and secure drilling permits at West Pogo; 40 percent (C$400,000) for generation of new projects; and 30 percent (C$300,000) for general corporate purposes.

The non-brokered private placement involved the issuance of 13.56 million units at C7.5 cents per unit. Each unit consists of one Millrock share and one warrant that entitles the holder to purchase one additional share for C14 cents until Dec. 14, C17 cents until Dec. 14, 2020 and C20 cents until Dec. 14, 2021.

–SHANE LASLEY