The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
Mining Explorers 2019 – Published Nov. 1, 2019
A Snowcat on the first ice road connecting Sabina's Back River gold property to the newly built port on Bathurst Inlet.
Sabina Gold & Silver Corp. budgeted C$41 million towards further de-risking its Back River gold mine project in Nunavut during 2019.
A 2015 feasibility study details plans for developing three deposits at Goose, one of seven properties that make up Sabina's larger Back River project. Ore from these deposits would feed a 3,000-metric-ton-per-day mill forecast to produce an average of 198,100 ounces of gold annually over an 11.8-year mine life.
Sabina gained the permits to develop this mine in 2018 and the 2019 program is designed to take measured steps in advancing Goose towards a production decision.
One of the major de-risking projects completed in 2018 was the construction of a port on Bathurst Inlet, north of the Goose Mine site.
The ability to access Back River via barge to the Bathurst Inlet port and then a roughly 170-kilometer- (105 miles) long ice road provides more efficient delivery of the equipment, fuel and supplies needed to support exploration and predevelopment activities.
Construction of the first ice road began in April of this year and deliveries of construction equipment; steel and supplies for bulk fuel tanks; and supplies for earthwork activities at the proposed Goose Mine site continued into May.
Delivery of equipment and supplies, along with the on-site predevelopment activities these provisions make possible, are designed to provide greater certainty on capital expenditure (CAPEX) components of the Goose gold mine and de-risk critical logistical elements of the project – creating value and improving the project readiness for when the time is right to make a production decision.
Sabina Gold is also creating value and improving Goose through the drill bit, including a 6,400-meter spring drill program.
The Goose Mine project hosts 12.4 million metric tons of reserves averaging 6.3 grams per metric tons gold in three open-pit deposits – Goose Main, Umwelt and Llama – and one underground – Umwelt UG – across a 7,000-meter long area.
The eight holes drilled during this spring 2019 drilling at Back River targeted three areas at Goose – Nuvuyak, Hook and Umwelt-Vault.
Nuvuyak, situated about 1,000 meters down-plunge of Goose Main, was discovered by Sabina last year.
The Nuvuyak discovery hole, 18GSE545, cut 39.5 meters averaging 11.58 grams per metric ton gold.
Four holes drilled this year expanded the strong gold mineralization at Nuvuyak for 370 meters along strike.
Highlights from this drilling include 3.5 meters of 18.71 g/t gold, 18 meters of 10.04 g/t gold, 6.95 meters of 10.15 g/t gold, 9.25 meters of 14.7 g/t gold and 8.6 meters of 10.52 g/t gold.
"At the Nuvuyak discovery, we believe we have confirmed the potential for a significant new deposit with the elements of high-grade gold in thick packages of iron formation that we see at the other Goose deposits (Umwelt, Goose Main and Llama)," said Sabina Gold President and CEO Bruce McLeod.
Hole 19GSE570 cut 5.35 meters of 2.74 g/t gold and 4.65 meters of 2.11 g/t gold in the Hook target, which lies between Goose Main and Nuvuyak.
Another of the 2019 holes, 19GSE569, cut 21.75 meters of 14.97 g/t gold about 180 meters up-plunge from the Umwelt Vault zone, a particularly robust core of the Umwelt underground deposit.
"The presence of a significant high-grade core within the Umwelt underground could provide opportunities for early advancement of underground resource extraction that could have positive impacts on the economics of the project," said McLeod.
The uncovering of a 50- by 20-meter bedrock exposure at the Goose Main deposit this summer has enabled detailed studies of mineralogy, stratigraphy and structure to further increase confidence in the deposit-scale mineralizing controls.
Sabina said these studies suggest the conditions leading to the abundant gold depositional event are consistent across the Goose and other Back River properties, which underscores the prospective nature of the district. The company plans to use the findings from this work to help refine targets for future exploration across the Back River project.
Over his more than 16 years of covering mining and mineral exploration, Shane has become renowned for his ability to report on the sector in a way that is technically sound enough to inform industry insiders while being easy to understand by a wider audience.
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