Alphamin Resources Corp ("Alphamin" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that a second phase of diamond drilling will commence on its flagship Bisie Prospect at its Bisie Tin Project in North Kivu Province, east central Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in April 2013. Initially one drill rig will be used, with a second rig expected on site early in the second Quarter.
An infill drilling programme of 23 drill holes for 3000m has been designed to follow up on excellent tin results reported from the Gecomines target area during the first phase of drilling. The programme will test mineralisation over a strike length of 275m down to a vertical depth of 200m and will enable the Company to release its first maiden resource estimate at Gecomines.
Significant results reported from the initial drilling programme at Gecomines included:
- BGC001: 12m @ 3.15% Sn from 53m, including 3m @ 6.14% Sn from 80m
- BGC002: 25.85m @ 2.26% Sn from 47.65m including 11m @ 4.75% Sn from 62.5m
- BGC005: 23.5m @ 0.85% Sn from 111.5m including 5.5m @ 2.27% Sn from 122m
- BGC006: 10.3m @ 0.98% Sn from 65.7m including 1.8m @ 3.12% Sn from 65.7m and 6.7m @ 1.11% Sn from 82.3m
- BGC007: 18.5m @ 2.21% Sn from 53m including 2.9m @ 6.27% Sn from 67.5m and 1.1m @ 6.23% Sn from 80m
Significant copper and light rare earth mineralisation (cerium and lanthanum) was intersected in all drill holes with a best intercept of 9.4m @ 1.01% Cu from 67m in BGC002.
Tin mineralisation has been defined over 500m in the Golgotha target area to the south (Figure 1) but generally has a lower overall tenor than the mineralisation at Gecomines. A second zone rich in zinc, lead and silver was also identified adjacent to or coincident with the tin zone at Golgotha. Copper and light rare earth mineralisation is closely associated with both tin and base metal mineralisation.
The mineralisation at Golgotha is associated with a 2.5km zinc in soil anomaly, shown in Figure 2. The Company has plans to first conduct an Induced Potential (IP) geophysical survey to better define drilling targets in the Golgotha target area before commencing with further drilling. For this reason the Company has decided to fast track a resource drilling programme at Gecomines before continuing to drill at Golgotha.
Petrological studies indicate mineralising fluids originated from late stage magmatic fluids derived from a nearby granite intrusive body exposed to the west of the Bisie ridge. The granitic body has not been intersected in any of the holes drilled to date implying that mineralisation at Bisie is likely to continue at considerable depths to 150m from surface.
Background
The Bisie project is located in the Walikale district of North Kivu Province, DRC and is held by Alphamin's 100% owned Mining and Processing Congo sprl (MPC). MPC holds a total of five tenements covering an area of 1,470sqkm with significant tin, gold and base metal potential. The key prospects within the Bisie Project are the Bisie Tin Prospect mined previously by artisanal means and the Omate gold workings exploited historically by the Belgians and currently mined extensively by artisanals.
The Bisie Prospect was the DRC's largest producer of tin ore for a number of years and accounted for up to 75% of the DRC's tin output.
Alphamin lifted force majeure on PR5266 which hosts the Bisie Prospect in February 2012 and commenced diamond drilling during the second half of 2012 at two target areas, Gecomines and Golgotha, mined extensively by artisanal miners. Significant high grade tin mineralisation was reported from drilling at both target areas. The tin mineralisation is also closely associated with copper and light rare earth (cerium and lanthanum) mineralisation as well massive and disseminated lead and zinc sulphides and significant amounts of silver.
Although tin does not respond to geochemical soil sampling due to its immobility, results from recent soil sampling programmes have highlighted lead and zinc in soils for a further 2km to the south of the Golgotha workings suggesting tin mineralisation can be expected for at least 2km to the south of Golgotha. The lead and zinc in soil anomaly has been defined over a minimum of 4km along the Bisie ridge and remains open to the south where the soil sampling has not been completed.
High grade mineralisation at Bisie appears to be controlled by a series of crosscutting northeast or east-west trending faults identified along the ridge from landsat imagery. The Company is therefore highly confident of discovering new high grade zones of tin and base metal mineralisation from systematic exploration along the ridge.
Mineralisation at Bisie is from surface on a ridge which lies at least 200m above the surrounding countryside and therefore highly amenable to open cut mining. This mineralisation is open at depths below 150m.
Lars Pearl, a qualified person under National Instrument 43-101, has verified technical data disclosed in this release.
Source: http://www.alphaminresources.com/