Apr 25 2017
Duran Ventures Inc. is pleased to announce the acquisition of three gold-silver mineral concessions in Northern Peru through direct application with the Peruvian Ministry of Mines or by direct purchase.
All concessions are 100% owned with no underlying royalties, are road accessible, were subject to varying forms of small scale artisanal mine workings, and were acquired as potential mineral sources for Duran's 80% owned Aguila Norte Mineral Processing Plant ("Aguila Norte" or the "Plant"). The three properties acquired are summarized below.
Miton de Oro
The Miton de Oro property is accessed via 157 kilometres of mostly asphalt road from Aguila Norte and consists of a 700 hectare concession application that was recently won in a closed bid auction that included Barrick and Newmont as competitors. Mineralization at Miton de Oro is considered similar to the past producing Machacala Au-Ag mine located 8.5 kilometres to the northwest. Historic production records that cannot be verified by the Company from the Machacala mine noted by the previous operators that 232,645 tons of ore were mined with average grades of 6 g/t Au and 10 g/t Ag. Highlights of initial reconnaissance sampling on the Miton de Oro property of an abandoned, 22 metre long artisanal drift located in the east of the property that exploited Low Sulphidation epithermal quartz veins hosted in pyroclastic rocks returned 127.1 g/t Ag with 1.15 g/t Au, 881.7 g/t Ag with 1.32 g/t Au, and 574.21 g/t Ag and 0.34 g/t Au on sample and vein widths of up to 40 cm. Hand selected quartz vein material from this artisanal workings dump pile returned 660.4 g/t Ag and 1,706.6 g/t Ag. Several other areas on the property have returned strong Au-Ag mineralization and will require further follow up. A large Low Sulphidation target may exist on the property.
The initial focus will be on the area of the artisanal workings. Exploration will involve reopening the historic workings where high grade silver and gold mineralization is located. Initial exploration will comprise of exploration drifts along and perpendicular to the mineralized structures. Any mineralized material from the drift will be shipped to Aguila Norte for processing. The Company intends to start the permitting for underground exploration once title is officially granted within the usual six week period.
Indio Inka
The 100% owned, 470 hectare Indio Inka Property is located roughly 224 kilometres by mostly asphalted road from the Aguila Norte processing plant. Duran's subsidiary Hatum Minas SAC purchased 100% of the property with a small cash payment with no underlying royalties. The property is located approximately 5 kilometres northeast of Eloro Resources's Victoria Gold Project in Northern Ancash.
The property's principal showing consists of high grade gold hosted in a near vertical, silicified breccia structure that roughly parallels bedding in the host lutite. The mineralized structure reaches 1 to 2 metres wide, and has been subject to artisanal development on two levels. Sampling within the old working, mostly from oxide/sulphide mix material, has returned results ranging from 1.48 to 13 g/t Au on 12 samples with sample lengths ranging from 0.4 to 1 metre. Initial metallurgical samples have shown 89% Au recovery (64% passing -200 mesh) from a Au-Ag-Cu concentrate flotation test in sulphide material and 92% Au recovery (90% passing -200 mesh) in cyanidation bottle roll tests in oxide material. The Company plans to extend the current mineralization by exploration drifting along the mineralized structures.
Pueblo de Oro
The 500 hectare Pueblo de Oro property is located in the Ancash Department near the small town of Pueblo Libre. The property is accessed via roughly 292 kilometres of mostly asphalt roads from the Aguila Norte plant and encompasses epithermal, oxide gold-silver mineralization hosted in fractured, brecciated, and faulted quartzites of the Chimu Formation. Historical mine workings are localized in a highly brecciated fault zone parallel to the hinge of an overturned, tightly folded syncline where at least two periods of exploitation have occurred including small, artisanal style tunnels and a large mechanically exploited stope measuring roughly 3,450 square metres entering the hill for 170 metres with widths of up to 30m. The area was originally claimed in 1980 by a private Peruvian company and was allowed to lapse in 2013. The property was visited and sampled by MacMillan Gold (now Duran) in 1996 but only recently acquired by Duran by application in 2014 with other bidders. Due to errors in other competitor's applications, the Peruvian Ministry rejected the applications and no closed bid auction was necessary. Duran was notified by the Ministry that it has been awarded the property and title registration should be completed in the next few weeks.
Sampling in the old workings has returned up to 7.33 g/t Au and 1058 g/t Ag in individual samples with sample lengths of 0.6m and 0.4m respectively. In total, 36 random samples were taken underground and averaged 0.73 g/t Au and 66.9 g/t Ag. It is apparent that the Au-Ag grade depends on the brecciation intensity. The old mine dumps returned anomalous results from grab samples with individual samples assaying 4 g/t Au and 431 g/t Ag. In total, 14 samples were collected from the old mine dumps and averaged 0.81 g/t Au and 151 g/t Ag. These samples are random grab samples outside the workings and are not necessarily representative of the mineralization hosted on the property. The Company intends to conduct mapping to understand the structural controls on the gold-silver mineralization.
The Company intends to find a partner to initially explore the property. The Chimu quartzites are excellent hosts for precious metal mineralization in Northern Peru. Barrick's massive Alto Chicama Mine and Tahoe's La Arena mines are excellent examples of this type of precious metal mineralization. The exploration target at Pueblo de Oro is underground high grade operation similar to PPX Mining's Igor Project in Northern Peru. Any agreement will first assess the economics of treating mineral at Duran's Aguila Norte plant during the development stage.
Jeffrey Reeder, CEO and President of Duran states "The Mineral Processing business is very competitive and secure mineral feed is the key to success. Our eventual corporate goal is to feed our Aguila Norte Plant with mineral from 100% owned Duran properties. These acquisitions are within acceptable transportation distances to the Aguila Norte Plant. We will continue to seek partners for our properties and focus on creating joint ventures and royalty streams. The acquisitions of these properties follow our business model as a Cash and Prospect Generator."
Quality Assurance and Quality Control
All sample lots were delivered to their respective laboratory by Company geologists where the laboratory crushed, pulverized, and split the sample for assay. No quality control material was submitted with the samples.
Miton de Oro samples were analysed for Au and Ag using fire assay with gravimetric finish by G&S laboratories of Trujillo, Peru, a private and independent laboratory. Two check samples were submitted to Minera Platinum, a separate private and independent laboratory, for Au and Ag analysis also using fire assay with gravimetric finish and the results fell within acceptable error limits.
Indio Inka samples were analysed by Inspectorate Services SAC for gold by fire assay with atomic absorption finish and with 44 element aqua regia digestion ICP emission spectroscopy. Samples containing more than 10 g/t gold were re-assayed analyzed using fire-assay with gravimetric finish. Reanalysis of the over-limit samples using fire-assay with gravimetric finish duplicated the previous results. No quality control material was employed in the sampling. All samples were also submitted for gold analysis by fire assay with ICP emission spectroscopy and achieved similar results to gold by fire assay with atomic absorption finish. Metallurgical tests for the Indio Inka property were completed by Minares Sur and Minera Platinum, two private and independent Peruvian laboratories.
Pueblo de Oro samples were analyzed by Inspectorate Services Peru SAC for gold and silver by fire-assay with atomic absorption finish. Over-limit gold and silver were reanalysed by fire assay with gravimetric finish.
Jeffrey Reeder, P.Geo., and a qualified person as defined in National Instrument 43-101, has prepared, supervised the preparation, or approved the scientific and technical disclosure contained in this news release.
Source: http://duranventuresinc.com/