Southern Silver Exploration Corp (TSX VENTURE:SSV) (FRANKFURT:SEG) reported today that optionee Freeport McMoRan Exploration Corp. has commenced drilling at the Dragoon Project, located 90 kilometres southeast of Tucson, Az.
The current program follows geophysical work and an earlier one-hole (1065 metre) drill program and will test an up-thrown block of prospective stratigraphy located approximately 400 metres to the southeast of the previous drill hole. Previous drilling on the property in 2010 by FMEC returned a 402 metre interval averaging 0.05 per cent copper and included several three-to-six-meter intervals averaging from 0.1 to 0.5 per cent copper. Southern Silver believes that these results, together with other historical data, suggest the presence of a large, deep-seated copper porphyry system disrupted by post-mineral faulting.
Oro Update
Southern Silver also reported it has added 40 additional claims at the Oro Project. This staking was done as interpretation of the recently conducted airborne magnetic geophysical survey suggests a much larger mineralizing system than originally believed with field checks confirming the presence of extensive alteration associated with the magnetic anomalies. The field examination included collection of additional geochemical samples and magnetic susceptibility readings at various surface locations and in the Company's 2010 core. These readings will allow a more detailed interpretation of the airborne magnetic data that when combined with the additional geochemical data, will allow drill sites to be chosen for two primary exploration targets: a deeply buried but large porphyry copper target and shallower, disseminated gold target. Drill permitting will begin as soon as this recently collected data has been assimilated, with drilling planned for late spring/early summer.
The Dragoon property is a contiguous block of 12.8 sq. km that consists of 68 unpatented mining claims and four State leases located in southeast Arizona. The property contains areas of exposed Copper-Molybdenum mineralization, Laramide-age porphyry and "leached capping" in the eastern part of the property, and a larger down-dropped block of porphyry-related rocks in the gravel-covered western portion of the property. The presence of the "leached cap" rocks is significant as it may overlie supergene-enriched copper mineralization at depth.
Southern Silver has the right to earn a 100% interest in the property by the payment of $500,000 by August 2012 and FMEC has the right to earn a 70% interest in the property by spending $3 million in exploration and development expenses on the property by December 31, 2012.
The Oro Project comprises a contiguous block of Federal, State and Private land totaling 15.1 sq km in the historic Eureka mining district in southwest New Mexico.
The New Mexico Bureau of Mines estimates production from small mines and workings within the Oro district between 1880 and 1961 at 2.9 million pounds of lead, 1.7 million pounds of zinc, 0.5 million pounds of copper, 450,000 ounces of silver, and 5,000 ounces of gold mined from shallow workings above the water table. Southern Silver's most recent work on the project suggests a high-potential to host further gold- and silver-enriched CRD deposits, and also bulk-tonnage intrusion-related gold mineralization or possibly a deeply buried copper porphyry system.
Southern Silver has the right to earn a 100% interest in the property by payments totaling $425,000 to private vendors by December 2011.
Source: Southern Silver Exploration Corp.