Exploration News Briefs
Cia de Minas Buenaventura, Peru’s largest publicly traded precious metals mining company, has signed an agreement with Global Geoscience, an Australian junior company headquartered in Sydney, to explore the latter’s Mancha Pampa copper-gold porphyry project in Peru. Buenaventura can earn a 61% ownership interest in the project by investing $3 million in exploration over a five-year period. Further, Buenaventura has the option of increasing this stake by an additional 19% via completion of a feasibility study if Global elects not to participate in this expenditure.
The Mancha Pampa project (100% owned by Global) is located 150 km southeast of Lima in the Yauyos District of central Peru. Work to date has identified an anomalous copper zone approximately 600 m by 450 m. Soil samples are generally over 120 ppm copper in this zone and range up to 5,150 ppm copper. The 150-m-wide northeastern third of this copper anomaly is generally more anomalous, with soil samples generally exceeding 1,000 ppm copper. Numerous rock chip samples have been collected within the high-copper soil zone, with copper contents averaging about 500 ppm. One grab sample contained 2.6% copper.
The area of the copper soil anomaly also contains anomalous molybdenum in soils, with values of more than 3 and up to 170 ppm molybdenum. Rock chip samples within this zone average 3 to 4 ppm and up to 157 ppm molybdenum.
Gold anomalous soil samples occur in a 600-m-long, 50- to 100-m-wide zone within the broader copper anomaly. These samples contain between 0.1 and 2.3 g/mt gold. A silver soil anomaly overlaps the eastern boundary of the copper soil anomaly, with silver assaying over 5 g/mt. Rock chip samples within this zone commonly exceed 2 g/mt silver. (www.buenaventura.com and www.globalgeo.com.au)
Iamgold is pursuing an aggressive exploration campaign at its Buckreef project in Tanzania. A 2,329-m diamond-drilling program was carried out during 2008 to augment structural studies and validate earlier reverse circulation drilling. Total Measured and Indicated resources at the project now stand at 1 million oz of gold at an average grade of 2 g/mt. Eight early-stage exploration targets on the property are being targeted by first-pass reconnaissance aircore drilling. Follow-up drilling is in progress, and additional targets have been identified by a geophysical gravity survey.
In eastern Senegal, Iamgold is exploring a significant gold mineralized trend at its Boto project. Work is currently targeting the Guemedji Trend, a 6-km-long mineralized corridor, to define drill targets in three distinct zones. A High Resolution I.P.-Resistivity geophysical survey was 60% complete prior to being temporarily interrupted by the annual rainy season. A minimum 5,000-m diamond drill program was tentatively scheduled to start in November and extend into 2009. (www.iamgold.com)