North of 60 Mining News - The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North

Crystal Lake Mining Corp. Sept. 18 announced results from a hole that cut shallow high-grade gold mineralization at the NW Zone on the company's Newmont Lake property in British Columbia's Golden Triangle.

Situated about 30 kilometers (19 miles) northwest of Skeena Resources' Eskay Creek project and about the same distance southeast of Teck Resources and Newmont Goldcorp's Galore Creek project, Newmont Lake is in an area known for copper and gold deposits.

NW Zone, which is related to the northeast trending McLymont fault on the Newmont Lake property, hosts 1.4 million metric tons of historical inferred resource containing 6.79 million pounds of copper, 200,000 oz gold and 291,000 oz silver.

The 2019 drilling is showing the potential to expand and upgrade this zone.

Hole NWDDH19-012 cut a thick unit of high-grade gold within a broad envelop of continuous lower-grade mineralization.

From a depth of 82 meters, this second hole drilled at NW Zone cut 44.1 meters averaging 4.03 grams per metric ton gold, 4.06 g/t silver and 0.29 percent copper. This broader intercept included a 5.3-meter interval averaging 7.57 g/t gold, 23.1 g/t silver and 1.03 percent copper from a depth of 87 meters; and eight meters of 15.11 g/t gold, 4.29 g/t silver and 0.68 percent copper from 106.3 meters.

Crystal Lake said the eight-meter-thick high-grade gold intercept demonstrates that the mineralized zone increases in both width and in grade in areas where previous models indicate a narrowing of the mineral zone.

Additionally, a second deeper horizon – 77.2 meters of 0.29 g/t gold – has been intersected in an area without gold mineralization in previous models adding to the exploration potential of the Newmont Lake gold corridor along the western flank of the Eskay Rift in NW BC.

Crystal Lake Mining Corp.

Multiple phases of pyrite with chalcopyrite mineralization encountered at a depth of 107 meters in hole NWDDH19-012 drilled near NW Zone on the Newmont Lake property.

"The western flank of the Eskay Rift is endowed with significant high-grade mineralization styles that fit with a wide range of deposit models, and require very efficient pathways for fluids and magma to migrate from depth to the surface and form ore deposits," explained Peter Lightfoot, a technical adviser to Crystal Lake Mining. "The gold mineralization developed along the western flank of the Newmont Lake graben is part of this wider mineral system, and Crystal Lake is aggressively developing an understanding of how the high-grade gold mineralization relates to the McLymont fault, its subsidiary faults and associated hydrothermal breccias."

Crystal Lake said the results from hole NWDDH19-012 underscore the potential for higher grades and increased continuity of mineralization, which can result in significant expansion of the historical NW Zone resource.

A third hole drilled in this NW Zone expansion area has encountered visually similar mineralization, according to the company – assays are pending – and a fourth hole in the area is underway.

–SHANE LASLEY