Red Pine Exploration Inc. [RPX-TSXV] shares were active Tuesday Aug 6 after the company said drilling has resumed at its Wawa Gold Project, located 2 km southeast of Wawa, northern Ontario.
The property is held 60% by Red Pine and 40% by Citabar LP, a limited partnership involved in exploration services for the resource sector. The Wawa Project covers over 5,500 hectares and hosts several former mines with combined historic production of 120,000 ounces of gold. Currently the largest gold discovery on the property is the Surluga deposit.
The exploration update, released on August 1, 2019, comes after the company recently filed a NI 43-101-compliant technical report for the Wawa Project that outlines two new resource estimates for the property. Red Pine said the Surluga deposit has an indicated resource of 1.2 million tonnes, grading 5.31 g/t gold or 205,000 ounces. On top of that is an inferred resource of 2.36 million tonnes, grading 5.22 g/t gold or 396,000 ounces.
The company said the Minto Mine South deposit has an indicated resource of 105,000 tonnes, grading 7.5 g/t gold or 25,000 ounces. On top of that is an inferred resource of 354,000 tonnes grading 6.6 g/t gold or 75,000 ounces.
Over 95% of the contained ounces at both deposits are located between surface and a depth of 350 metres. Both deposits remain open at depth.
Red Pine said it has identified an additional six gold-bearing structures at the Wawa Project. It said the Cooper Shear System, located 1 km north of the northernmost extension of the Surluga deposit, is structurally and mineralogically similar to the structure of the Minto Shear System.
Mechanized stripping was undertaken at the Cooper Structure in June 2019 to confirm the continuity of the structure. Selected zones were channel sampled for grade control at surface and results from channel sampling are pending.
The company said the new drilling program is focused on testing priority targets at the newly discovered Cooper Structure, proving the continuation of the Surluga deposit to depth beyond the footprint of the current resource, and testing strategic exploration targets in the Horneblende Shear Zone.
The Hornblende Shear Zone is a positive anomaly associated with a wide gold intersection of 0.4 g/t gold over 73.8 metres, including 13 g/t gold over 1.08 metres.
Drilling at the Cooper Structure is expected to continue until mid-August, followed by drilling at the Surluga deposit, the company said.
Red Pine shares jumped 14.3% or $0.005 to $0.04 on Tuesday on volume of 372,200. The shares are currently trading in a 52-week range of $0.03 and $0.08.
“We were successful in upgrading the Surluga deposit, considering the requirement for reasonable prospects of eventual economic extraction, from a pit-constrained model to an underground resource model that is accessible utilizing the existing underground mining infrastructure,” said Red Pine President and CEO Quentin Yarie.
“Our strategy moving forward will be to continue to define shallow, high-grade deposits, on the property and prove the extension of the Surluga and Minto Mine South deposits beyond the relatively shallow footprints of the current mineral resources,” he said.