Widening gold zones good sign for Colomac

Nighthawk Gold Corp. Dec. 3 said recent drilling shows that Zone 2.0 at Colomac is getting thicker with depth, which indicates significant resource expansion potential for this central project on the company's 899-square-kilometer (222,203 acres) Indin Lake gold property in Northwest Territories.

Indin Lake hosts seven major project areas – Colomac, Leta Arm, Damoti Lake, Treasure Island, JPK, Fishhook and Echo-Indin – each with multiple gold exploration targets.

Colomac, however, is the flagship project on the property and the primary target for roughly 40,000 meters of drilling being completed at Indin Lake this year.

According to a calculation completed mid-2018, Colomac hosts 50.31 million metric tons of inferred resource averaging 1.62 g/t (2.6 million oz) gold.

Early in its 2019 exploration season, Nighthawk reported results for 16 holes targeting high-grade areas within the central 3,000-meter portion of the roughly 9,000-meter Colomac Main sill. (A sill is a tabular sheet intrusion, often horizontal, between older layers of sedimentary rock.)

The best intercept came in C19-08, which cut 56 meters averaging 13.49 grams per metric ton gold, including 16.5 meters of 34.18 g/t gold at Zone 1.5.

This is the highest-grade gold intercept encountered so far at Colomac.

Previous drilling has indicated that the sill at Zone 1.5 and adjacent Zone 2.0 is getting thicker at depth. Nighthawk said the latest round of drill results seem to confirm this.

Hole C19-39B at Zone 2.0 shows the continued widening of the mineralized portion of the sill to depth, where the true width has grown to more than 110 meters at 700 meters below surface. This hole was drilled approximately 270 meters south of the deepest intersection at Zone 1.5, where drilling in 2017 showed a similar widening of the mineralized portion of the sill to 155 meters in true width.

From a depth of 702.3 meters, C19-39B cut 110.5 meters (55 meters true-width) averaging 1.89 g/t gold.

The newly defined panel of mineralization, formed by the merger of high-grade Zone 1.5 with the northern part of Zone 2.0, has now been traced approximately 500 meters in strike with its narrowest width of 30 meters at shallow depths but expanding to upwards of 155 meters at 800 meters vertical depth where it remains open.

"We were very pleased to confirm that the widening of the sill does not appear to be an isolated feature, but that the entire Zone 1.5 - Zone 2.0 mineralized panel resembles a wedge form that widens significantly to depth," said Nighthawk Gold President and CEO Michael Byron. "We believe that the dimensions of this mineralized panel will have a positive impact on our resource growth and has opened the door for exciting new exploration opportunities at Colomac."

In addition to the deep drilling at Zone 2.0, the company reported results from holes C19-38 and C19-38B, which tested near surface mineralization at Zone 3.5, which is at the southern end of the Colomac Main sill.

Hole C19-38 cut 11.2 meters averaging 4.41 g/t gold from a depth of 35.8 meters, including 6.6 meters of 7.09 g/t gold from 38.7 meters.

C19-38B cut nine meters of 1.94 g/t gold from 78.5 meters and six meters of 3.24 g/t gold from 120.2 meters.

Nighthawk said these intercepts represent a new style of Colomac mineralization that will need to be further explored in 2020.

–SHANE LASLEY