Columbus Gold Corporation has announced that Phase II drilling has commenced at its Stevens Basin project, located in the Eureka Mining District on the Battle Mountain Gold Trend, Nevada, about 9 km (5.6 miles) southwest of Barrick Gold's Archimedes/Ruby Hill open pit gold mine, where joint venture partner Navaho Gold, can earn an initial 51% interest by completing minimum exploration expenditures.
Navaho reports that eight to ten RC holes, totaling approximately 1,200 m (3,937 ft), are planned in the current phase of drilling which is designed to follow-up the highly anomalous gold mineralization intersected in hole SB11-009 (15.2 m @ 0.18 g/t from 35 m depth) drilled by Navaho in Phase I drilling in mid-2011. The drilling will also test a further suite of structural features, a magnetic target with features analogous to the Archimedes/Ruby Hill deposit identified from interpretation of gravity data, and, further multi-element soil anomalies defined by sampling completed by Navaho in recent months.
Stevens Basin is an unusual gravel-filled semi-circular basin, approximately 10-13 km2 (6.2-8 miles) in area. Surrounding the basin are hills of Paleozoic sedimentary rocks which, along its northern margin, consist of mainly Devonian age limestone containing areas of altered and mineralized intrusive rock and siltstone float. In the area of drilling the target horizon is a calcareous siltstone unit inferred to dip off the outcropping limestone out under the gravel cover. Based on the conventional model for Carlin-style deposits, mineralization is expected to be best developed where the prospective host unit intersects controlling structures capable of introducing the mineralizing fluids.
At Barrick Gold Corp's Archimedes/Ruby Hill gold mine, located in a similar structural setting, 9 km (5.6 miles) to the southwest of Stevens Basin, the gold mineralization has an association with elevated base-metals (zinc in particular) and barite-rich hydrothermal breccias. The Archimedes deposit also occurs in close proximity to a Cretaceous intrusive stock and, given the elevated zinc returned from Navaho Gold's hole SB11-11 at Stevens Basin, widespread Ba anomalism and the possible existence of an intrusive body in the central portion of Stevens Basin as inferred from the airborne magnetic data, Navaho Gold believes that the drill results to date at Stevens Basin could indicate an analogous mineralized setting to the Archimedes/Ruby Hill deposit.
Andy Wallace is a Certified Professional Geologist (CPG) with the American Institute of Professional Geologists and is the Qualified Person under NI 43-101 who has reviewed and approved the technical contents of this news release.
Source: www.columbusgoldcorp.com