AQUILA RESOURCES INC. (TSX:AQA) (FRANKFURT:JM4A) has announced the first drill results from the first 13 holes of a 20 hole drilling program at its 100% owned Michigan Gold Project targeting precious metal mineralization in the Marquette Greenstone Belt in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, which comprises a number of properties in the Marquette Greenstone Belt.
The overall exploration effort is designed to add gold resources to Aquila's asset base in the Upper Peninsula, which includes the Back Forty Project, a joint venture with HudBay Minerals Inc. ("HudBay")(TSX:HBM)(NYSE:HBM) which is in an advanced stage of exploring and developing an 18 million tonne VMS zinc/gold deposit.
Initial results are from the Peninsula Property, the first of several highly prospective properties comprising the Michigan Gold Project. Drilling results included the following near-surface intercepts from an extension of known mineralization at the property:
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4.48 g/t gold over 3.08 meters in Pen 10-9
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3.72 g/t gold over 4.88 meters in Pen 10-10
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9.47 g/t gold over 16.67 meters in Pen 10-11
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8.62 g/t gold over 2.88 meters in Pen 10-13
The drill results are from an initial program targeting shear zone hosted gold mineralization at the Peninsula Property where previous drilling by Callahan Mining Corp. in the 1980's partially defined gold mineralization along approximately 150 meters of strike length. Aquila's drilling was designed to confirm the structure in the area of previous drilling as well as to extend the mineralization beyond the limits of previous drilling in an area of mineralized outcrops discovered by Aquila last year.
The current drilling encountered significant near surface mineralization in a 150 meter extension (B Zone) of the previously defined Peninsula shear zone, with six of the holes reporting visible gold, including an interval of 0.5 meters of 225 g/t gold (6.56 ounces per ton) in Pen 10-11. Pending results include seven additional drill holes including two containing visible gold.
The Peninsula shear zone consists of a 2 to 15 meter thick, steeply dipping zone of shearing, brecciation and quartz carbonate veining. Higher grade portions contain quartz veining and silicification, locally with visible gold. Silver values are low – generally in the single digit ppm range, and only trace amounts of pyrite and other sulfides are normally present. The zone has now been partially defined along approximately 300 meters of strike length and remains open along strike and down dip.
"This is an excellent start to Aquila's strategy to develop gold assets on the back of our joint venture interest in the Back Forty Project," stated Tom Quigley, Aquila's President. "We are excited to kick off our Michigan gold exploration program with such positive results, and are optimistic about continuing to expand this target with more drilling. Although our present focus is on developing gold resources in the area of the Back Forty development to capitalize on potential gold circuit infrastructure, we are also acquiring other properties and projects further removed from the Back Forty Project, with excellent potential to further add gold and silver resources to Aquila's asset base."
Assays Pending and Continuing Drilling
Assays are still pending for an additional seven holes from the Peninsula target, and following receipt of these, the mineralized B Zone extension will be modeled with previous drill information, and a subsequent program of follow-up drilling will be designed and implemented. In the meantime, drilling is continuing on additional gold targets in the Marquette Greenstone Belt, with drilling in progress at the Silver Creek gold target north of the Peninsula.
Silver Creek Property
Five holes have been completed at the Silver Creek Property targeting sheared and highly altered felsic intrusive rocks. One of these holes contains visible gold. The Silver Creek Property is located approximately eight miles north of the Peninsula Property.
Quality Assurance and Quality Control
Exploration core drilling was NQ size. The core was logged and mineralized intersections were marked for sampling and assaying by geologists and geo-technicians employed by Aquila Resources Inc. and the HudBay Aquila Joint Venture. The marked intersections or intervals were sawn in half by a diamond saw and one-half of the core was placed in sample bags and tagged with unique sample numbers, while the remaining half was returned to the core box for storage. Each bagged core sample was transported to Minerals Processing Corporation's sample prep lab in Carney, Michigan where it was dried, crushed and pulverized and a 250-gram sample was prepared and split, with one split for assaying at Inspectorate Labs in Sparks, Nevada. Strict sampling and QA/QC protocol are followed, including the insertion of standards and blanks in the sample stream on a regular basis. Sample intervals are typically 1.5 meters. Analytical method for gold is fire assay with atomic adsorption finish and gravimetric finish for samples greater than 3.0 g/t gold. All other elements are analyzed by ICP with silver over limits (>200 g/t) analyzed by fire assay/gravimetric finish and base metal over limits analyzed by AAS.
Assaying integrity is monitored internally with a quality control program, which includes the use of assay sample standards, blanks, duplicates and repeats, and externally through national and international programs. This news release provides core lengths and estimates of vertical thickness only. True widths are not provided. Where metal assays are provided for intersections they are either a single assay of a sample of the entire intersection length or a composite of assays calculated from interval weighted assays over the intersection length.
Thomas O. Quigley is the Qualified Person for Aquila as described in National Instrument 43-101 responsible for contents of this release.
Source: AQUILA RESOURCES INC.