The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
7 of 12 holes drilled at Prew returned higher than 1 oz/t gold North of 60 Mining News – October 20, 2023
Visible gold in core from a one-meter drill intercept in hole P23-2480 averaging 55 g/t gold.
Prew Zone is the first area to be mined from new underground development at the Premier deposit.
Ascot Resources Ltd. Oct. 19 reported that the latest batch of assays from 12 holes includes seven that cut greater than an ounce of gold per metric ton at the Prew Zone, which is the first area of the Premier deposit to be mined when a new era of operations begins at the Premier Mine in British Columbia's Golden Triangle.
Lying about 15 kilometers (nine miles) north of Stewart, BC, Ascot's Premier gold project is home to a past-producing gold mine that last operated in the 1990s.
A feasibility study completed in 2020 detailed plans to develop four underground mines – Big Missouri, Premier, Silver Coin, and Red Mountain – that will feed ore to an upgraded mill at Premier. At 2,500 metric tons per day, this operation is expected to produce roughly 1.1 million ounces of gold and 3 million oz of silver over the first eight years of mining.
This mine plan is based on 3.63 million metric tons of probable reserves averaging 5.45 grams per metric ton (637,000 oz) gold and 19.1 g/t (2.23 million oz) silver within the Big Missouri, Silver Coin, and Premier deposits; plus 2.55 million metric tons of proven and probable reserves averaging 6.52 g/t (534,000 oz) gold and 20.6 g/t (1.69 million oz) silver at the nearby Red Mountain project.
While finalizing the work needed to begin a new era of operations at the past-producing Premier Mine, Ascot continued to drill in and around deposits slated for early mining.
This drilling began with 16 holes at Prew Zone, which lies about 500 meters southeast of the mill.
In August, the company reported assays from the first holes from this drilling. Highlights from this batch of holes drilled toward the eastern end of Prew include:
• 6.5 meters averaging 23.37 g/t gold and 54.3 g/t silver in hole P23-2465.
• 4.9 meters averaging 32.85 g/t gold and 216.2 g/t silver in P23-2468.
The latest batch of assays is from 12 holes that continued to the west at Prew. Highlights from this latest batch of Prew Zone assays include:
• 1.68 meters averaging 42.2 g/t gold in hole P23-2471.
• 4.28 meters averaging 21.98 g/t gold in hole P23-2472, including 1.05 meters averaging 85.8 g/t gold.
• 6.87 meters averaging 18.93 g/t gold in hole P23-2475, including 2.3 meters averaging 44.55 g/t gold.
• 2.51 meters averaging 28.45 g/t gold in hole P23-2476, including 1.18 meters averaging 55 g/t gold.
• 3.86 meters averaging 23.24 g/t gold in hole P23-2480, including one meter averaging 55 g/t gold.
"With seven assays grading over an ounce per tonne gold in just these twelve holes, we are pleased with the high-grade tenor of the drill results, and better than expected sizes and grades in the Prew Zone," said Ascot Resources President and CEO Derik White.
Procon Mining & Tunnelling Ltd., which entered into a contract with Ascot earlier this year to carry out underground mining, is driving a new ramp down into Prew Zone of the Premier deposit.
"Development work recently commenced on the Premier portal and decline which will access the Prew Zone anticipated in early 2024 prior to mill start-up and initial gold production," White continued. "Intercepting more high-grade gold in existing stope shapes and finding extensions and new lenses of mineralization is encouraging, especially for an area so near term in the mine plan."
Ore from Prew Zone, which is the second area to be mined, will complement the existing mining at Big Missouri, a deposit about five miles north of the mill that Ascot began developing last year.
After finishing up at Prew, the 2023 Premier drilling shifted to the Big Missouri deposit and associated Day Zone, where two rigs have since completed 5,368 meters of drilling in 62 drill holes.
Assays for all holes drilled in this area slated for initial Premier mining are pending.
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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