Avidian advances Amanita, Golden Zone

Avidian Gold Corp. Jan. 16 provided highlights from the 2019 exploration programs on its Amanita and Golden Zone properties in Alaska.

The 3,608-acre Amanita property is on state land boarding the south side of Kinross Gold Corp.'s Kinross Mine. Exploration by Avidian and others have identified one or more oxide gold resources within the Tonsina Trend, a structural corridor on the Amanita property that extends northeast onto the Fort Knox property.

Highlights from previous drilling along the Amanita portion of the Tonsina Trend include:

• 4.6 meters of 11.4 grams per metric ton gold;

• 22.9 meters of 1.01 g/t gold;

• 12.2 meters of 2.28 g/t gold; and

• 13.7 meters of 3.02 g/t gold.

Avidian's 2019 work program at Amanita focused on sampling the Tonsina Trend with a series of widely spaced trenches along a 3,000-meter section of the corridor.

Highlights from the trenching include:

• 94.5 meters of 3.04 g/t gold; including 22.5 meters of 11.51 g/t gold; and

• 27 meters of 4.22 g/t gold; including six meters of 13.85 g/t gold.

Avidian said these trench results, combined with the historical drilling, highlight the wide distribution of oxide gold mineralization with significant widths and grades.

The company plans to carry out additional trenching to extend the surface exposure of the Tonsina Trend mineralization during 2020, which will be followed by a drill program designed to test the identified targets.

Avidian also continued to make new discoveries at Golden Zone, a gold-silver-copper property about 200 miles north of Anchorage, Alaska.

Situated just 10 miles west of the Parks Highway, the primary route between Anchorage to Fairbanks, the Golden Zone property hosts numerous gold targets along a 15,000-meter-long trend. Breccia Pipe, the most advanced of these, is a deposit with 4.19 metric tons of indicated resource averaging 1.99 g/t (267,400 oz) gold and 10.38 g/t (1.4 million oz) silver.

The Breccia Pipe deposit has had limited drill testing below 200 meters from surface, resulting in incomplete testing of the margins of the pipe as well as the enclosing mineralized host rock, particularly in the southwest portion of the breccia body.

Sampling and relogging of core from Breccia Pipe and adjacent Mayflower Extension Zone, predominantly skarn- or replacement-type mineralization that extends for at least 350 meters along strike.

GZ17-10, drilled at Mayflower in 2017, cut 21.6 meters averaging 1.46 g/t gold, including 2.6 g/t across the last three meters, indicating that the mineralized conglomerate remains open on strike and at depth.

GZ17-05, drilled 300 meters southwest of GZ17-10, cut 10.5 meters grading 1.54 g/t gold, essentially at surface.

GZ18-02, a 2018 hole drilled 50 meters southwest of GZ17-10, cut 17.7 meters averaging 2.12 g/t Au in similar mineralization.

The most apparent extension of the sparsely drilled Mayflower zone is to the northeast where it projects into a gold-in-soil anomaly. The MEZ has only been sparsely tested with drilling along this 350 meter strike length and at depth.

Avidian's 2019 region sampling program at Golden Zone discovered a new mineralized occurrence dubbed MJ about 3,400 meters southwest of JJ, a zone discovered in 2018.

Grab samples collected from MJ last year returned assay of 5.17 and 4.2 g/t gold; and 2.77 percent copper within a 200- by 200-meter mineralized area that remains open in all directions.

Prospecting and detailed sampling has also extended the strike of the JJ-J4 discovery to at least 750 meters and it remains open in both directions. Grab samples of gossan zones at JJ returned assays ranging from 2.08 g/t to 6.14 g/t gold, and chip samples from this zone include 12 meters of 1.4 g/t gold and six meters of 1.85 g/t gold.

Surface mapping and compilation has also identified skarn- or replacement-type mineralization hosted with a conglomeratic unit at Copper King, an enticing prospect that has been traced over 1,500 meters. One trench across Copper King cut three meters of 16.08 g/t gold, 50.6 g/t silver and 0.78 percent copper.

Avidian's 2020 program at Golden Zone is expected to include further surface exploration to define drill targets at the target JJ-J4 and the MJ prospects. Drilling at Copper King and the Breccia Pipe area, including the Mayflower Extension Zone, is also being considered.

–SHANE LASLEY