The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
Mining Explorers 2024 - January 15, 2025
B2Gold has completed 18,380 meters of resource definition and 6,610 meters of exploration drilling at its Goose Mine project in Nunavut this year.
While making its final push to the first gold pour at Goose Mine, B2Gold Corp. continues to explore the upside potential at its Back River gold project in Nunavut.
Lying in southwestern Nunavut about 325 miles (520 kilometers) northeast of Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, the 144,245-acre (58,734 acres) Back River project consists of ten claim blocks – Bath, Beech, Boot, Boulder, Del, George, Goose, Malley, Needle, Wishbone.
Since acquiring Back River through the C$1.1 billion ($800 million) buyout of Sabina Gold & Silver Corp. in 2023, B2Gold has been focused on developing a more than 300,000-ounce-per-year gold mine at Goose.
After investing more than C$1.5 billion ($1.1 billion) in construction and mine development, B2Gold is on track to ramp up commercial production at the Goose gold mine by midyear.
While B2Gold has gold mines in Africa and the Philippines, Goose will be the British Columbia-headquartered company's first operation in Canada. The company, however, is positioning itself for growth in Canada's North with investments in Snowline Gold Corp. and Prospector Metals Corp, a pair of Yukon-focused exploration companies with promising gold assets.
While crews were finishing up the development of B2Gold's first mining operation in Canada, the company invested roughly $28 million (C$39 million) on a Back River exploration program focused on enhancing and growing the significant resource base at the Goose and surrounding regional targets.
Going into 2024, the Goose project hosted 9.7 million metric tons of measured resource averaging 5.75 grams per metric ton (1.8 million oz) gold, 16.6 million metric tons of indicated resource averaging 6.18 g/t (3.3 million oz) gold, and 8.4 million metric tons of inferred resource averaging 6.64 g/t (1.8 million oz) gold.
These resources are found in five deposits – Umwelt, Llama, Goose, Echo, and Nuvuyak – along a five-mile (eight kilometers) trend at Goose.
Out of the 25,125 meters of drilling completed at Back River through early November, roughly 18,380 meters targeted at the Umwelt and Llama deposits are within the current mine plan.
B2Gold says the 14,480 meters drilled over the first 10 months of 2024 at Umwelt has confirmed the continuity of high-grade mineralization. The company says some of the holes cut higher-grade gold than was predicted by the current mineral resource model.
Highlights from drilling at Umwelt include:
• 11.1 meters averaging 27.28 g/t gold in hole 24GSE-671.
• 15.95 meters averaging 19.63 g/t gold in hole 24GSE-675.
• 15.5 meters averaging 11.18 g/t gold in hole 24GSE-681.
• 22.79 meters averaging 29.49 g/t gold in hole 24GSE-684B.
• 21.45 meters averaging 10.51 g/t gold in hole 24GSE-685.
One hole drilled at Llama last year (24GSE-663) cut 27.05 meters averaging 14.34 g/t gold 530 meters down plunge from the open pit at Llama, demonstrating the continuity of mineralization below the surfacing deposit at the west end of a five-mile (eight kilometers) trend of mineralization included in the current Goose Mine plan.
B2Gold is particularly excited about the high gold grades drilled last year at Nuvuyak and Mammoth; two deposits down-plunge from the Goose Main deposit that are not included in the current mine plan.
One exploration hole drilled at Nuvuyak (24GSE-683Z) cut 28.8 meters averaging 6.39 g/t gold, including 6.45 meters averaging 23.49 g/t gold, 1,000 meters west and down-plunge from the Goose Main deposit.
The best hole drilled at Mammoth, which lies between Nuvuyak and Goose Main, cut 10.96 meters averaging 17.45 g/t gold, including 2.51 meters averaging 68.61 g/t gold.
The 2024 regional exploration program at Back River also included mapping, prospecting, trench, sampling, and geophysics across several of the outlying claim blocks.
George, the second most advanced Back River property, hosts 7.1 million metric tons of indicated resource averaging 5.34 g/t (1.2 million oz) gold and 5.4 million metric tons of inferred resource averaging 6.12 g/t (1.1 million oz) gold.
B2Gold's 2024 regional exploration, however, focused primarily on six other properties – Boot, Boulder, Del, BB13, Needle and Beech.
The company says this regional exploration has generated new targets that will be further evaluated and drilled in 2025.
Since establishing a foothold in Canada's North with the acquisition of Back River, B2Gold has invested in junior exploration companies with promising gold projects in the Yukon.
This began with a strategic investment early in 2023 to buy a 9.9% stake in Snowline, one of the hottest gold exploration companies in Canada. At the time of the investment, Snowline had not calculated a resource for Valley, the primary target on its Rouge property in the Yukon, but the very long intersections of strong gold mineralization drilled there indicated the project's potential.
In mid-2024, Snowline published an inaugural resource for Valley with 7.3 million oz of gold. According to this calculation, the deposit in eastern Yukon hosts 76 million metric tons of indicated resources averaging 1.66 g/t (4.05 million oz) gold, plus 81 million metric tons of inferred resources averaging 1.25 g/t (3.26 million oz) gold.
"In just two full exploration seasons, Snowline has advanced its Valley target from greenfield discovery holes to a robust multi-million-ounce gold deposit with continued exploration upside," said Snowline Gold CEO Scott Berdahl.
Intercepts such as the 244.9 meters averaging 4.05 g/t cut during 2024 drilling underscores the exploration upside at Valley.
While expanding Valley, Snowline continues to explore other promising targets across its portfolio of six properties – Rogue, Einarson, Ursa, Cynthia, Olympus, Tosh, and Cliff – covering more than 889,600 acres (360,000 hectares) of gold-prospective land in the Yukon.
In 2024, B2Gold also acquired a 9.9% stake in Prospector Metals, a relatively new mineral company exploring the Mike Lake (ML) property about 50 miles (80 kilometers) northeast of Dawson City, Yukon.
"We are excited to have B2Gold as a keystone shareholder in Prospector Metals and our team is looking forward to their technical input on our flagship ML project, Yukon," said Prospector Metals CEO Rob Carpenter. "B2Gold is a major global gold producer with a strong commitment to communities, sustainable mining and employee safety.
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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