The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
Property-wide survey reveals three new anomalies under mine North of 60 Mining News – December 23, 2022
Located within the traditional territory of the Selkirk First Nation in the Minto Copper Belt of the Yukon, the Minto Mine has been in operation since 2007, with underground mining commencing in 2014. Since 2007, approximately 500 million lb of copper has been produced at this Yukon operation.
Minto Metals Corp. Dec. 20 announced the results from its 2022 magnetotellurics geophysical survey over its Minto copper mine property in Yukon, Canada.
Magnetotellurics is a passive electromagnetic technique that maps resistivity by measuring telluric currents induced in the earth by natural sources such as lightning, solar flares, and ionospheric resonances.
In layman, this essentially means sensitive equipment detects the natural electrical currents that flow through the Earth.
Different from conventional MT surveys, SPARTAN MT is a full-tensor audio-magnetotelluric technology that acquires data in the 10 kilohertz to 0.001-hertz frequency band, meaning it picks up the extremely fine audio signals from these electrical currents – much like the squeaking noise when electricity is heard, only much higher in pitch.
Commissioning Quantec Geoscience Ltd., Minto had the company conduct a SPARTAN MT survey over the property. The goal was to extend the geophysical coverage for the Minto property to depths below the extents of previous surveys, diamond drilling, and current mining infrastructure to assess the potential for additional economic mineralization.
Consisting of a total of 184 SPARTAN MT sites, Quantec completed the survey between July and August, with final results received in November.
Results highlighted three significant low resistivity, moderate to high conductive anomalies on the Minto property:
• A large low resistivity anomaly below the Minto orebodies that extends to a depth of approximately 300 meters elevation, or roughly 650 meters below the current mine development and 1,000 meters below the surface.
• A low-moderate resistivity anomaly to the northeast of the mine workings that appears to follow the regional northwest-southeast structure. This anomaly extends from 200 meters elevation to approximately 900 meters elevation (1,100 meters of interest).
• A large, low resistivity anomaly at the south end of Minto that likely represents the younger Little Ridge/Casino Formation mafic volcanics and associated sediments.
"We are very pleased with the results from the MT survey," said Minto Metals Vice President of Exploration David Benson. "The results indicate prospectivity at depth below the current mine levels and validates our initial thinking that the current Minto resource base is limited by the depth of the historical drilling. Equally, we are very excited about drill-testing Anomaly 'B' in 2023 as this has the potential to be a new, mineralized system at Minto. The company plans to drill test both Anomalies' A' and 'B' from surface and underground drill platforms in 2023."
Aside from the potential deepening of Minto's resource, the company completed its drilling program for the year and is still awaiting the results from 19 drill holes that targeted both Minto North and Minto East.
The company expects to report on these drill results in early January.
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