Avidian Gold Corp. Feb. 28 announced an update from the Copper King and Long Creek 2021 reverse-circulation drill program at its district-scale Golden Zone project strategically located in Southcentral Alaska.

"The 2021 drilling results suggest that in the Copper King & Long Creek area, a nearby mineralized intrusive provided gold, copper and silver-bearing solutions that precipitated into favourable permeable sedimentary units that can be traced for over 2 kilometers and that could ultimately host a copper, gold plus silver deposit," said Avidian Gold President and CEO Steve Roebuck. "In addition, all indications are that the source intrusive is likely at a shallow depth and that modestly deeper drilling will be required to test it as it is this type of target that could host a large deposit. These results in conjunction with the previous results reported on the property clearly show its potential to host one or more significant deposits."

Located just south of the Golden Zone's Mayflower and Breccia Pipe deposits – of which the most advanced Breccia Pipe hosts 4.19 metric tons of indicated resource averaging 1.99 grams per metric ton (267,400 ounces) gold and 10.38 g/t (1.4 oz) silver – a total of 1,512.5 meters in 10 RC holes were drilled within the Copper King and Long Creek area, as a follow-up to the previous drilling to test continuity of a known mineralized conglomeratic unit and geophysical targets related to a large magnetic low and a controlled-source audio-frequency magnetotelluric (CSAMT) impedance anomaly.

The Copper King and Long Creek area occurs in the Long Creek mineralized corridor, which is characterized by copper-silver-gold mineralization in a variety of geological settings over a two-kilometer- (1.2 miles) long strike length.

Mineralization styles at Copper King occurring within 250 meters of the main granite outcrop include replacement mineralization in conglomerate such as seen in T18-11 that encountered 21 meters of 0.13 g/t gold, 13.1 g/t silver, and 0.45% copper; massive sulfide skarn mineralization such as 9.1 meters of 8.71 g/t gold, 80.8 g/t silver, and 3.57% copper in hole CK18-01; stockwork quartz mineralization such as in a grab sample that returned 4.8 g/t gold, 106 g/t silver, and 1.41% copper; and quartz-sulfide vein mineralization as seen in historic hole CK-94-2 that returned 6.1 meters of 1.09 g/t gold, 9.17 g/t silver, and 0.36% copper; as well as mafic dike-related mineralization as in a grab sample that returned 1.44 g/t gold, 87.5 g/t silver, and 3.29% copper.

Of the 10 holes, three were drilled in the Long Creek prospect last year, with holes GZ21RC-07 and 08 being the two southernmost holes, and drilled from the same location near trench TR18-05 that encountered 3 meters of 16.08 g/t gold, 50.6 g/t silver, and 0.78% copper; and hole GZ21RC-09 targeted a large CSAMT impedance anomaly.

GZ21RC-07 intercepted 10.67 meters averaging 0.51 g/t gold, 7.3 g/t silver, and 0.19% copper, including 1.52 meters averaging 2.23 g/t gold, 18.3 g/t silver, and 0.43% copper; GZ21RC-08 intercepted 7.62 meters averaging 4.1 g/t silver and 0.11% copper; while the final hole in this area GZ21RC-09 intercepted 3.04 meters averaging 0.13 g/t gold, and 6.9 g/t silver.

The last seven holes were drilled in the Copper King prospect area, which returned only a minor percentage of the expected conglomerate, with metal values being generally low.

Besides its highly prospective Golden Zone project, Avidian has been advancing its Fairbanks Mining District projects, Amanita and Amanita NE, of which the former has seen exciting results from its drill program while preliminary exploration and mapping is still being undertaken at the latter.