Peak Gold hits gold-silver-copper at Hona

Contango ORE Inc. Nov. 19 reported gold, silver and copper mineralization in its first two holes at Hona, a prospect on state of Alaska mining claims about 15 miles west of the Peak Gold deposits, which are located on a 675,000-acre land package leased from Tetlin Village, an Alaska Native corporation in eastern Alaska.

Peak Gold LLC, a joint venture between Contango ORE (60 percent) and Royal Gold Inc. (40 percent), staked 183,422 acres of state mining claims covering Hona and other prospects west of the Tetlin lease late in 2016. Work completed by Alaska Division of Geological & Geophysical Surveys earlier that year found evidence of intrusion related gold or porphyry copper-gold deposits at Hona, also known as Noah.

Peak Gold's 2019 work at Hona included reconnaissance rock sampling and mapping to follow up on as much as 9.9 grams per metric ton gold found in pan samples collected from streams draining the Hona prospect. These efforts identified extensive sulfide mineralization over 5,000 meters of strike with gold, copper and silver mineralization. Rock samples collected from the area returned assays as high as 12.5 g/t gold, 10.09 percent copper and 494 g/t silver.

Due to the widespread mineralization encountered in surface mapping and sampling at Hona, Peak Gold completed 1,300 meters of core drilling in two holes at Hona this year.

Both holes encountered gold-silver-copper mineralization, with the most encouraging intercept being 17 meters of 0.41 g/t gold, 5.4 g/t silver and 0.33 percent copper in 19002, the second hole drilled at Hona this year.

Hole 19002 tested ground closer to the main mass of the Hona intrusive and encountered thicker intervals of copper-gold mineralization hosted in potassic-altered metasediments, suggesting the source for heat, alteration and mineralization is located to the east. Hole 190002 was angled toward the east and the 17-meter intercept was encountered at 612.7 meters.

Contango said the mineralization to the east possibly related to the main Hona intrusive mass centered on Vertical Angle Benchmark (VABM) Hona. Surface samples from the intrusive at VABM Hona returned up to 12.5 g/t gold and 10.09 percent copper.

"We are excited for Peak Gold to drill more core holes on the Hona prospect, as it covers a large area with known intrusive and schist-hosted mineralization observed on the surface, and meaningful thickness of mineralized material as seen in Hole HN19002," said Contango ORE President and CEO Brad Juneau.

Rock sampling, dating and geologic mapping suggest that the age and metal zoning of Hona is similar to that of the Peak resource area. However, mineralization at Hona is associated with, and in some cases hosted by, intrusive rocks, while the intrusive body responsible for mineralization at Peak has not been identified.

Following completion of the drilling program at Hona, Peak Gold completed a 1,006 line-kilometer magnetic and versatile time domain electromagnetics (VTEM) survey at Hona. Final reduction and interpretation of the data from this late-October geophysical survey is in progress.

"Once all of the interpretation is complete, we expect the findings will support a decision by Peak Gold to resume drilling in 2020 on this prospect, as well as other promising exploration targets on our existing claims," said Juneau. "We have sufficient cash on hand of approximately US$5.5 million to fund our anticipated share of the follow up drilling by Peak Gold on Hona in 2020 but may consider other financing options should the joint venture budget a larger exploration effort next year."

Peak Gold also drilled three holes at East Peak and one hole at North Saddle. While these holes cut sporadic gold intercepts, the thickness required for development were not encountered.

–SHANE LASLEY