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

HighGold Mining Inc. April 13 said the final batch of assay results from the 2020 drilling at Johnson Tract in Southcentral Alaska includes one hole that extended the JT deposit by about 180 meters along strike and down-dip.

According to a calculation completed in April of last year, the JT deposit hosts 2.14 million metric tons of indicated resource averaging 6.07 grams per metric ton (417,000 ounces) gold, 5.8 g/t (397,000 oz) silver, 5.85% (275.3 million pounds) zinc, 0.57% (26.8 million lb) copper, and 0.71% (37.6 million lb) lead.

The 32 holes drilled by HighGold during its 2020 program at Johnson Tract targeted extensions of JT, as well as prospective resource expansion areas near the deposit.

Highlights from previously reported drill intercepts on the margins of the JT deposit mineral resource area include:

• 74.1 meters averaging 17.89 g/t gold, 7.1 g/t silver, 0.48% copper, 7.28% zinc, and 1.31% lead in hole JT20-092.

• 75.1 meters averaging 10.01 g/t gold, 6 g/t silver, 0.57% copper, 9.36% zinc, and 1.11% lead in JT20-093.

JT20-111B, among the nine holes included in the final batch of assay results, cut 7.9 meters averaging 2% copper, 1.7% zinc, and 18 g/t silver about 180 meters southwest of any hole drilled by the company so far.

As a result, the strike length of the JT deposit has been expanded to 500 meters, a roughly 50% increase over the previous strike of 325 meters, and a down-plunge distance of 575 meters. HighGold says the deposit remains open along strike to the northeast and southwest, and at depth.

Including JT20-111B, seven of the nine holes reported tested JT expansion areas. Some of the other highlights from these holes include:

• One meter averaging 2.98 g/t gold, 3.2 g/t silver, 0.49% copper, and 4.07% zinc in JT20-109.

• 56.1 meters averaging 0.42 g/t gold, 1.5 g/t silver, 0.06% copper, and 1.97% zinc in JT20-115.

• Three meters averaging 0.14 g/t gold, 5.3 g/t silver, 0.13% copper, and 5.84% zinc in JT20-118B.

"We are very pleased to see that the extent of the JT mineralized system is growing as we continue to step out northeast and down-plunge of the deposit," said HighGold Mining President and CEO Darwin Green. "Focus will now turn to the upcoming 2021 field season in which we will be targeting both larger step-outs to the northeast and down-plunge with wide-spaced drilling for additional zones of high-grade gold and continued expansion of the JT deposit."

Slated to get underway in mid-May, the 2021 drill program will also test the Gap target, a sparsely drilled northeast-trending prospective corridor between JT and the original Northeast Offset target.

Based on the alteration and mineralization observed at surface, previous Johnson Tract explorers theorized that the Northeast Offset target was the fault offset continuation of the JT deposit roughly 500 to 800 meters to the southwest.

The geology encountered during HighGold's 2020 drilling, however, shows that this mineralization is not on the east side of the Dacite fault that sliced through the JT Deposit, as was originally postulated, but on the same side of the fault as the resource. As a result, the mineralization encountered in these holes is not the fault-displaced equivalent of JT, but a second distinct zone of mineralization located on the same western side of the Dacite fault as the deposit.

"I am particularly encouraged by the new mineralization documented, 200 meters up-valley from the main JT deposit, in what we call our Gap target," Green said.

HighGold also plans to complete drilling at DC (Dry Creek), a prospect about 2.5 miles (four kilometers) northeast of the JT deposit.

Surface exploration carried out during the 2020 season led to the discovery of a high-grade silver-gold-zinc vein field covering a 250- by 700-meter area south of the historical gold showing at DC.

Highlighted assays from the rock samples collected from this area include:

• 1,800 g/t silver, 0.4 g/t gold, and 0.5% zinc.

• 1,280 g/t silver, 1.9 g/t gold, and 0.9% zinc.

• 517 g/t silver, 1.1 g/t gold, and 2.8% zinc.

The 2020 exploration field program also significantly expanded a 'gold-in-soil' anomaly defined by HighGold during 2019, including delineation of a new 320-meter-long sub-parallel gold-in-soil anomaly.

At the northern end of the DC prospect and at lower elevation, rock sampling has also identified an area of high-grade copper mineralization. Rock samples from this area returned grades as high as 9.87% and 3.98% copper.

Sampling at Milkbone, a prospect along a fault about 400 meters west of DC, identified a strong gold-in-soil anomaly with supporting high-grade rock sample results from near-source boulders and subcrop.

Soil samples collected along a 150-meter-long line crossing a large alteration zone at Milkbone ranged from 70 parts per billion up to 4,390 ppb (4.39 g/t) gold.

One high-grade rock sample collected from this Milkbone prospect area contained 184 g/t gold, 46 g/t silver, 20% lead, 2.1% zinc, and 0.1% copper. Another rock sample contained 5.2% zinc and 0.4 g/t gold.

Green says HighGold will rank a series of large gold and silver mineralized targets in the DC area that are prime targets for follow-up.

"There is much to be excited about as the 2021 drill season approaches," he said.

Author Bio

Shane Lasley, Publisher

Over his more than 16 years of covering mining and mineral exploration, Shane has become renowned for his ability to report on the sector in a way that is technically sound enough to inform industry insiders while being easy to understand by a wider audience.

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