Exploring Great Bear’s Dixie Lake gold project in northwestern Ontario. Source: Great Bear Resources Ltd.
Great Bear Resources Ltd. [GBR-TSXV] on Wednesday released more drill results from its 100%-owned Dixie Lake project in northwestern Ontario.
The latest results are from 19 holes totalling 4,290 metres from the Hinge and South Limb zones. The company said it has expanded its recent high grade gold discoveries and identified a new ultramafic unit in the core of the Dixie gold system.
The company also said a second drill rig will be mobilized early in 2019 as it accelerates its fully financed, ongoing 30,000-metre drill program.
Great Bear shares fell 12.50% or 35 cents to $2.45 on Wednesday. The shares are trading in a 52-week range of $3.50 and 31 cents.
Great Bear has attracted interest from major players, including Bay Street gold bug Rob McEwen and his company McEwen Mining Inc. [MUX-TSX], after recently reporting a high grade gold discovery in the Red Lake mining camp, which has already produced about 30 million ounces of gold.
Geologists often say that the best place to make new discoveries is in the vicinity of existing deposits.
Its properties are located about 28 kilometres from Goldcorp.’s [G-TSX, NYSE-GG] Red Lake Gold Mine, which has been in production since the late 1940s. That mine is expected to produce 235,000 ounces of gold this year at an all-in-sustaining cost of $1,000 an ounce.
The company is currently engaged in a 30,000-metre, approximately 150-drill-hole program at the Dixie Lake property, which is expected to continue through 2018 and 2019. Expanded exploration work will be informed by ongoing results, and may include additional drilling, geophysical surveys, trenching, and downhole survey methods.
On Wednesday, Great Bear said reconnaissance drilling tested a large 220-metre (east-west) by 190-metre (vertical) area of the South Limb and Hinge zones.
The company said drilling below the Hinge Zone discovery extended continuous gold mineralization from surface to a depth of 190 metres and the zone is open to extension.
The deepest hole is located 114 metres down plunge of the Hinge discovery and returned 3.65 metres of 27.36 g/t gold (estimated true width), including 0.5 metres of 153.73 g/t gold.
Eighteen of the 19 drill holes intersected quartz veins with visible gold at the predicted plunge and dip. Gold was observed in all of the 19 holes. High grade gold of greater than 15 g/t was observed in seven of 19 drill holes.
Other Hinge Zone results include 14.1 metres of 4.45 g/t gold (estimated true width), including 0.50 metres of 49.93 g/t gold and 0.5 metres of 36.71 g/t gold. The Hinge Zone shows strong grade continuity and varies from 1.5 to 14.1 metres in estimated true width where drilled to date, the company said.
“We rank this new drilling success as our most significant gold discovery at the Dixie project to date, as it clearly exceeded our expectations for what is best described as reconnaissance drilling of the new South Limb zone and Hinge Zone areas,’’ said Great Bear President and CEO Chris Taylor.
“In addition to expanding these zones, we have simultaneously identified an important ultramafic-related gold control that advances our understanding of the gold system and points to potential for discovery of additional gold zones elsewhere on the project.’’
Targets to be drilled throughout the rest of this year and 2019 include the Hinge, South Limb and Dixie Lake zones as well as a number of newly defined, high prospective geological and structural targets across the project.