Copper Mountain Mining Corporation announces initial results from its ongoing exploration program at the Copper Mountain Project near Princeton, BC. Presently two diamond drills are working at the mine site to meet our three immediate objectives that include:
1) infill drilling to upgrade resources to reserve status for detailed mine planning;
2) condemnation drilling to assist with infrastructure development related to mine operations and mine site planning; and
3) deep exploration drilling designed to evaluate deep seated geophysical anomalies and assist with long range mine and exploration planning.
Prior to the diamond drilling program in the Oriole zone 83 shallow percussion holes were drilled on an approximate 25 meter spaced grid in order to better understand the geology and controls of high grade mineralization. Samples were taken every 4 meters via a cyclone attached to the drill. Samples were split 4 times on site with a rifle splitter in order to reduce the sample to less than 5 kgs, and shipped to Pioneer Laboratory for analysis.
Assay results have been received for 83 percussion holes drilled in the Oriole zone and for three condemnation/exploration holes drilled just to the east of the eastern end of Pit 2 where a new access road is being planned.
The Oriole area, which is generally higher grade material, is located just to the south of Pit 3 and is being considered for early stage mining as it is situated within an area planned for future waste rock storage.
Mineralization in the Oriole zone is hosted by moderately altered volcanic rocks sandwiched between barren intrusive and unaltered volcanic rocks and cut by late non-mineralized felsite dykes. The percussion holes provided significant information on the contacts between mineralization and barren dykes and bounding non-mineralized rock. Of the 83 percussion holes, 13 were located within barren intrusive rocks, 14 were drilled into barren volcanic rock, and an additional 10 holes were drilled within dyke rock. Of the remaining holes, 38 intersected grades above the 0.15% copper cut-off grade and define a northeasterly trending, elliptical shaped area of mineralization approximately 210 meters long by 120 meters wide. Results from ten percussion holes drilled to a depth of about 30 meters within the core of the mineralized zone are listed below:
On the basis of the results of the percussion holes, twelve diamond drill holes have just been completed in the Oriole zone to assist with reserve estimation and pit planning. Assays of the diamond drill holes are pending.
East of Pit 2, three diamond drill holes totaling 772m were drilled in an area slated for infrastructure development, but which hosted a small Titan 24 geophysical anomaly at shallow to moderate depths. Drill hole 10P2-161 drilled to the southeast towards the geophysical anomaly, intersected narrow mineralized zones (6m @ 0.93% Cu, 0.46g/t Au and 2.2 g/t Ag and 9m @ 0.20% Cu, 0.08g/t Au and 0.6 g/t Ag) near the collar but did not return significant intersections within the area of the geophysics anomaly. Drill hole 10P2-162 drilled to the south towards the geophysical anomaly intersected low grade mineralization within the anomalous area (25.4m grading 0.16% Cu). Drill hole 10P2-162 was drilled from near the same collar area as the other two holes but in a southwesterly direction towards Pit 2 and intersected an 18m thick zone of mineralization grading 0.35% Cu, 0.13 g/t Au and 2.1 g/t Ag just beyond the planned pit wall, highlighting the potential for additional shallow drilling to add resources in this area.
Deep drilling adjacent to and below the Pit 3 area is ongoing as is additional exploration drilling within the Saddle zone adjacent to pits 1, 2 and 3 and results will be released as information becomes available.
Quality Assurance
The company employs a system of quality control for drill results which includes the use of blanks, certified reference material (standards) and check assaying. Core from the 2010 exploration program will be logged on site and split with a diamond saw. Samples will be shipped to Pioneer Laboratories for geochemical analysis of copper with all values of greater than 1,000 ppm copper being re-analysed by assay methods for copper, gold and silver. The drilling program is being supervised by Peter Holbek, M.Sc., P.Geo., a qualified person as defined by National Policy Instrument 43-101.
SOURCE: Copper Mountain Mining Corporation