The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
First holes ever drilled confirm discovery of new porphyry North of 60 Mining News – November 17, 2023
Cascadia Minerals Ltd. Nov. 16 announced that the first two holes ever drilled at Catch encountered the porphyry copper-gold the company had hoped to find at this project in Yukon, Canada.
Earlier this year, Hecla Mining Company cut a deal to buy out ATAC Resources, keeping the precious metals enriched Rackla and Connaught properties in the Yukon and spinning out the rest of ATAC's properties into Cascadia.
Managed by the former ATAC team and backed by an initial C$2 million investment by Hecla, Cascadia is now exploring several of its past properties, which include Catch (copper-gold), Rosy (gold-silver), and Idaho Creek (copper-gold) in the Yukon, as well as the PIL (copper-gold-silver-molydenum) project in Northern British Columbia.
Located in an underexplored part of southcentral Yukon, about 56 kilometers (35 miles) southeast of Carmacks, previously undrilled Catch is a 15.7-square-kilometer (3,880 acres) property prospective for significant copper and gold porphyry mineralization.
Optioning Catch at the onset of 2022 from a local geologist, Cascadia quickly endeavored to crack open this underexplored greenfields property. Last year, the company initiated the first exploration phase, which consisted of prospecting, mapping, soil sampling, and geophysical surveys. This included collecting 50 rock samples and 359 soil samples, as well as completing 10.1 line-kilometers of induced polarization and 49.3 line-kilometers of ground magnetic surveys.
Highlights from the sampling include:
• 1.36% copper and 0.13 grams per metric ton gold.
• 1.01% copper and 1.03 g/t gold.
• 1.57% copper.
This year, Cascadia carried out the first drilling ever at Catch. While a total of 2,462 meters were drilled in five holes, the company is pleased to report the results from the first two ever drilled on this previously unknown greenfield discovery.
Both holes yielded significant copper-gold mineralization, confirming a new copper-gold porphyry discovery.
"To have made a significant copper-gold porphyry discovery in the first two holes ever drilled on a project is incredibly rare," said Cascadia Minerals President and CEO Graham Downs. "We can now focus on expanding known mineralization and exploring for even higher-grade zones, whilst simultaneously testing numerous additional targets."
Highlights from the first two Catch holes include:
• 45.83 meters averaging 0.3% copper and 0.15 g/t gold from surface in hole CA-23-001, within a broader interval of 333.87 meters averaging 0.13% copper.
• 116.6 meters averaging 0.31% copper and 0.3 g/t gold from a depth of 356 meters in CA-23-002, within a broader interval of 435 meters averaging 0.16% copper and 0.09 g/t gold.
Drilled 160 meters apart, from the results of the geophysical surveys of 2022, these holes were collared in the middle of a coincident 1,200- by 600-meter chargeability and 800- by 600-meter magnetic anomalies that are now beginning to be tested.
"Our second hole returned over a hundred metres of 0.31% copper and 0.30 g/t gold, comparable to the resource grade of Newmont's operating Red Chris open-pit mine in BC's Golden Triangle (measured and indicated open-pit grade of 0.34% copper and 0.28 g/t gold)," added Downs. "We have clearly tapped into a large porphyry system and eagerly await results from the remaining three holes that were drilled at the Main Zone, two kilometers to the north."
While the remaining three holes were drilled in the Main Zone, the first two were drilled in the Diorite Zone.
Already aware that the Catch property hosts multiple new greenfield discoveries of copper-gold porphyry mineralization, Cascadia is already planning ahead to expand the extent of its property limits to encompass as much as it can of this emerging district.
"Cascadia is the first mover in the underexplored extension of the Stikine Terrane in Yukon, and we will utilize Catch as a case study regionally to acquire additional land throughout this compelling new porphyry district, as we prepare for an early 2024 drill program at Catch," finished Downs.
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