Vancouver, British Columbia-based War Eagle Mining Co. Inc. has partnered with Strategic Metals Ltd. to drill for the first time the Antimony Mountain copper-silver-gold porphyry prospect, 65 kilometers (40 miles) northeast of Dawson City, Yukon Territory.

Reconnaissance field work started in late June, with core drilling beginning in August. A total of 1,000 meters (3,275 feet) is planned for this year's five-hole program, according to an Aug. 26 press release.

"This summer's work program budget is $400,000, of which roughly $300,000 was for the 4-5 hole drill program," said Bob Farris, vice president of corporate development for War Eagle.

The company formed a 50-50 joint venture with Strategic Metals, announced in late April, to explore Antimony Mountain. The 2,100-acre property was acquired through claim staking, with no underlying interests, according to War Eagle.

Earlier work completed this summer includes detailed geological mapping, prospecting and soil sampling, coupled with drill site preparation, the company said. Access is by helicopter, although an old bulldozer trail links the property with the Dempster Highway, 15 kilometers to the west.

Claims cover pluton

The company's claims cover the northwest part of the Antimony Mountain pluton, a syenite to monzonite stock that intrudes late Proterozoic quartzose metasedimentary rocks. According to War Eagle, the stock belongs to the 93-90 million year old Tombstone Intrusive Suite that stretches from east-central Alaska to the Northwest Territory border.

This belt is genetically and spatially related to numerous gold deposits and occurrences, including Fort Knox, True North and Pogo in Alaska; and Brewery Creek, Dublin Gulch and the Keno Hill Mining Camp in Yukon, the company said.

The drill target at the Antimony Mountain property, Wizard Ridge, is a 1.5 kilometer diameter area of strongly anomalous copper and precious metal geochemical values associated with visible surface mineralization. Soil samples from both sides of Wizard Ridge returned encouraging values with gold between 100 and 1,195 parts per billion and copper between 200 and 700 parts per million.

"The favorable host rocks, size and intensity of the geochemical anomalies and presence of mineralized veins suggest excellent potential for large tonnage porphyry type mineralization," the company said.

Visual mineralization reported

In its Aug. 26 news release, War Eagle reported the first drill hole intersected visual mineralization. Drilling had been completed to the depth of 230 meters (759 feet) with a target depth of 300 meters (980 feet) for that first hole.

"Sulfide mineralization has been observed throughout the entire core length with the mineralization both disseminated in the syenite host rock as well as along fracture planes," the company said. "The core is presently being split for assay."

Significant historical mineralization at Antimony Mountain consists of northeast-trending fault and fracture controlled auriferous arsenopyrite and antimony veins in the hornfels aureole and around the margin of the pluton.

These veins are currently held by independent prospectors. Claims held by War Eagle and Strategic Metals are located within the pluton itself. They cover a large area of strong multi-element soil and silt geochemical anomalies that have never received adequate follow-up for examination of bulk tonnage copper-silver-gold mineralization, War Eagle said.

Past exploration work

Mineralization was first discovered in 1916 by a prospector who found stibnite or antimony veins in an aplite dyke cutting syenite at the southwest edge of the Antimony Mountain pluton, the company said.

Conwest Exploration explored a number of gold-bearing arsenopyrite veins along the northeast margin of the pluton in 1966, producing drill results ranging up to 28.5 grams of gold per ton over 2.74 meters, War Eagle said. Other past exploration operators included Total Energold Corp. and Kennecott Canada Exploration, working in the area between 1975 and 1998.

"Very little exploration has been done to evaluate bulk tonnage copper-silver-gold targets within the Antimony Mountain pluton," War Eagle said. "Total Energold conducted reconnaissance scale geochemistry within and around the intrusion."

That company's follow-up work focused primarily on the known vein showings, despite significant widespread copper-silver-gold geochemical samples collected from four drainages of the flank of Wizard Ridge.

War Eagle and Strategic Metals are focused on a 3.5 kilometer by two kilometer anomaly, based on soil and silt samples, on Wizard Ridge, which bisects the companies' claims from northwest to southeast.

"Based on this and the unusually strong geochemical response, the Antimony Mountain property contains what is arguably the best undrilled alkalic porphyry copper-silver-gold exploration target in western Canada," the company said.

Other well-known western Canadian examples of this deposit type include the Galore Creek deposit, the Red-Chris deposit and the Mount Polley Mine, War Eagle said.