Sojourn Exploration Inc. Dec. 12 reported results from this year's sampling at Todd Creek, a porphyry copper-gold property about 40 kilometers (25 miles) southeast of Seabridge Gold Inc.'s enormous KSM project.

A time domain induced polarization survey carried out this year at Todd Creek showed a significant chargeability anomaly underlies the Yellow Bowl zone, a roughly 3,000-meter-long corridor of strongly altered and variably copper-gold mineralized intermediate volcanic rocks, porphyritic intrusions and associated breccias.

Fifty rock chip and grab samples collected over a 700- by 1,200-meter area at Yellow Bowl averaged 0.68 percent copper, including ten samples with more than 1 percent copper.

Sojourn said this zone, containing widespread copper-rich magmatic-hydrothermal breccias, has never been drilled.

"Our 2018 Todd Creek reconnaissance program suggests that the Yellow Bowl zone, a gossan of significant size containing widespread copper-gold occurrences, represents the upper levels of an untested porphyry copper system," said Sojourn Exploration President Tyler Ruks. "Yellow Bowl is flanked by distal, high grade gold-copper veins and breccias at South Zone and Fall Creek. Previously, the Yellow Bowl, South Zone and Fall Creek zones have been explored as distinct entities. The results of our 2018 program suggest that these zones are likely related and part of a large system, the core of which is completely untested by drilling.

Located about 3,000 meters north of Yellow Bowl, Fall Creek was also sampled this year.

Historical trenching and drilling completed by Noranda in the 1980s delineated multiple zones of brecciation and veining across a 500- by 300-meter area. One hole drilled by Noranda in 1988 cut 12.65 meters of 7.61 g/t gold and 1.58 percent.

With only limited time to investigate Fall Creek, Sojourn was only able to collect six samples there this year.

Two samples of breccia-hosted mineralization collected from a trench there returned 37.7 g/t gold, 30.5 g/t silver and 5.3 percent copper; and 2.83 g/t gold, 9.8 g/t silver and 2.42 percent copper.

Rock sampling and reconnaissance geological mapping carried out roughly 5,000 meters southeast of Yellow Bowl has confirmed the presence of outcropping volcanogenic massive sulfide style mineralization at the VMS zone.

Massive sulfides were first discovered below a receding glacier at the yet-to-be drilled VMS zone in 2008. Previous channel sampling of this zone returned grades up to 0.74 percent copper, 1.35 g/t gold and 9.7 percent zinc.

Eight samples collected this year averaged 0.213 g/t gold, 30.1 g/t silver, 0.53 percent copper, 0.53 percent lead and 2.54 percent zinc, including individual assays up to 1.98 percent copper, 9.15 percent zinc, 0.392 g/t gold and 112 g/t silver.

Sojourn said mineralization has been traced for up to 900 meters at VMS.

In addition to revisiting previously identified targets, Sojourn said its 2018 work at Todd Creek has identified a new zone of rhyolite breccia in a recently exposed area dubbed the Smokin' zone on the eastern side of the Todd Creek valley.

This year's sampling of Smokin Zone returned up to 0.266 g/t gold, 1,120 parts per million arsenic and 51 ppm antimony. The mineralization identified here is hosted in rhyolite breccias within Upper Hazelton Group mudstones, which is similar to the high-grade gold-silver VMS deposits Barrick Gold Corp. previously mined at Eskay Creek about 60 kilometers (37 miles) to the northwest.

Sojourn aims to have a partner funded drill program lined out for Todd Creek in 2019. This initial phase of drilling will test for an underlying porphyry copper-gold system at Yellow Bowl.

–SHANE LASLEY