The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
North of 60 Mining News - May 8, 2024
High-powered electromagnetic surveys continue to generate new targets at American West Metals' Storm copper project in Nunavut, Canada.
American West Metals Ltd. May 7 reported that preliminary results from a moving loop electromagnetic (MLEM) geophysical survey at Storm has identified new anomalies that indicate strong potential for resource expansion at this high-grade copper project in Nunavut.
"The initial data from the Moving Loop Electromagnetic (MLEM) survey has been received and is highlighting new high-priority targets along strike of known high-grade mineralization, and also around and along strike from the known copper deposits," said American West Metals Managing Director Dave O'Neill. "The scale and strength of some of the new anomalies, and the low false positive rate when using EM systems at Storm, make them compelling targets that are ready to be tested with drilling."
According to an inaugural calculation completed earlier this year, four deposits within a roughly 10-square-kilometer (3.9 square miles) area of the Storm property host 17.48 million metric tons of Australian Joint Ore Reserves Committee- (JORC) compliant indicated and inferred resources averaging 1.17% (452 million lb) copper and 3.38 grams per metric ton (1.9 million oz) silver.
To identify resource expansion targets for a more than 20,000-meter drill program already underway, American West is carrying out a high-powered MLEM survey over this area, as well as over other targets across the wider Storm property.
Preliminary results from this geophysical survey indicate that the high-grade copper mineralization outlined so far at the Cyclone deposit, which hosts roughly 70% of the overall Storm resource, likely extends in most directions.
Preliminary MLEM survey results indicate that copper mineralization likely extends in most directions from the Cyclone deposit. Hotter colors indicate higher conductivity.
The company says this interpretation is supported by previous drilling on the margins of the Cyclone deposit. Highlights from drilling at and beyond the edges of Cyclone include:
• 16 meters averaging 3.07% copper in hole SROR1601D.
• 10.2 meters averaging 2.1% copper from a depth of 17.3 meters and 5.8 meters of 3.6% copper from 38.6 meters in hole ST99-53.
• 6.1 meters averaging 2.1% copper in hole SR23-41
American West says EM anomalies have also been identified over 1,000 meters along strike from the Chinook deposit, as well as in the Thunder, Lightning Ridge, and Gap discovery areas.
"The MLEM data has reinforced our belief in the outstanding growth potential of the project and that further, undiscovered zones of high-grade copper mineralization exist in unexplored areas of the project," said O'Neill. "Given the MLEM only detects the higher-grade copper mineralization at Storm, the potential copper endowment in the vicinity of the EM targets may be much more than the scale of the EM anomalies, further highlighting the resource expansion opportunity."
Gaps in this survey are completed and will be integrated into the final modeling and interpretation.
The MLEM survey is ongoing. Once the western portion of the survey is complete, the team will then work toward the Blizzard and Tornado Prospect areas, which lie about 10 kilometers (six miles) to the east.
In the meantime, drilling that got started in April continues. This drilling will test new targets identified with the MLEM survey, previously identified EM anomalies and other high-priority targets for near-surface high-grade copper mineralization.
A second track-mounted reverse circulation (RC) rig is currently being mobilized to join the RC and two diamond drill rigs already onsite.
"We are very pleased to report that the drilling and exploration program for 2024 is advancing rapidly at the Storm Copper Project in Nunavut, Canada," said O'Neill.
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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