The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
Planning a drill program to expand known high-grade resource North of 60 Mining News – March 18, 2022
Core from massive sulfide mineralization grading 9.3% copper and 15.2 g/t silver encountered in hole CD21-001, drilled during PolarX' 2021 program at Caribou Dome.
PolarX Ltd. March 15 announced that it plans to carry out further drilling this year to expand upon the very high-grade copper mineralization encountered last year at its Caribou Dome project in Alaska.
Located toward the western end of the Australia-based company's 22-mile- (35 kilometers) long Alaska Range property, Caribou Dome hosts 2.8 million metric tons of combined measured, indicated, and inferred resources averaging 3.1% (189.6 million pounds) copper in nine lenses of volcanic sediment-hosted mineralization.
In February, PolarX reported results from four infill holes drilled last year to collect fresh samples for metallurgical testing. These holes cut mineralization with copper grades that exceed those predicted by the resource block model.
Highlights from these holes include:
• 9.8 meters (6.5 meters estimated true thickness) averaging 6.8% copper and 7.8 grams per metric ton silver from a depth of 25.28 meters in hole CD21-001.
• 19.1 meters (12.6 meters true thickness) averaging 7% copper and 11.2 g/t silver from a depth of 45.16 meters in hole CD21-001.
• 5.9 meters (3.9 meters true thickness) averaging 6.8% copper and 10.9 g/t silver from a depth of 58.4 meters in hole CD21-001.
• 10.7 meters (7.5 meters true thickness) averaging 7.4% copper and 15.4 g/t silver from a depth of 26 meters in hole CD21-003.
The exploration company's initial evaluation of the results found that the very high-grade mineralization has not been closed off at depth or along strike.
"These results show there is scope for significant growth in the Caribou Dome resource," said PolarX Executive Chair Mark Bojanjac. "The high grades and the density of the mineralization exceed our resource model and it remains open along strike and at depth."
The company is designing a new drill program to test extensions to the known high-grade copper mineralization at Caribou Dome.
The remaining four holes drilled at Caribou Dome tested co-incident copper geochemical and induced polarization geophysical anomalies less than 1,000 meters away from the resource area. While these holes cut native copper visible in the core, PolarX says the grades are not significant enough to justify further exploration for the style of mineralization encountered.
PolarX sees better commercial value in expanding the zones of high-grade massive sulfide copper in the current deposit.
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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