Ascot Resources Ltd. Aug. 14 reported that its Premier gold mine in Northern British Columbia remains on track for first gold production in the first quarter of 2024.

Lying next to the town of Stewart at the southern tip of BC's Golden Triangle, Premier is home to a past-producing gold mine that last operated in the 1990s.

A feasibility study completed in 2020 envisions four underground mines – Big Missouri, Silver Coin, Premier, and Red Mountain – feeding ore to an updated version of the existing mill. At 2,500 metric tons per day, this operation is expected to produce roughly 1.1 million ounces of gold and 3 million oz of silver over the first eight years.

This mine plan is based on 3.63 million metric tons of probable reserves averaging 5.45 grams per metric ton (637,000 oz) gold and 19.1 g/t (2.23 million oz) silver within the Big Missouri, Silver Coin, and Premier deposits; plus 2.55 million metric tons of proven and probable reserves averaging 6.52 g/t (534,000 oz) gold and 20.6 g/t (1.69 million oz) silver at the nearby Red Mountain project.

In January, Ascot closed a financing package that included a US$110 million (approximately C$149 million) deposit on gold and silver streaming agreements, plus a C$50 million strategic equity investment.

Upon closing the financing, Ascot remobilized contractors to finish development of the new Premier gold mine.

"Construction activity at the Premier Gold Project continued to increase in the second quarter, with much progress being made on the critical outdoor and earthworks areas, including the tailings storage facility and new water treatment plant," said Ascot Resources President and CEO Derek White. "As of Q2 2023, detailed engineering and major procurement are substantially complete, and project construction excluding mine development is at 48%."

At the end of July, Ascot entered into a lease agreement with Caterpillar Financial Services for an equipment lease facility up to US$15 million (C$20 million) for surface mining and construction equipment. This was followed with a contract that secures underground mining services from Procon Mining & Tunnelling Ltd. for three years, with the option for two one-year extensions.

In 2022, work commenced on the S1 portal, and approximately 907 meters of underground development was completed in the Big Missouri area before being paused for the winter.

Procon will continue advancing the 907 meters of underground development started by Ascot at Missouri, which is slated to deliver the first ore to the Premier mill.

The contract mining company will also start a new ramp development at the Premier deposit immediately adjacent to the existing mill facilities. They will drive the initial access ramp from surface down into the Premier deposit for initial mining at the Prew zone.

On the exploration front, Ascot has one drill turning at the Prew zone. The first nine drill holes have been completed and have intercepted visual sulfide mineralization very close to expected depth and corresponding stope locations. Visible gold was intercepted in one of the drill holes.

Based on this drilling, Ascot says it appears that the location and geometry of the mineralization at Prew is well defined and should provide a good starting point for mining operations.

In addition to drilling at Prew, the 2023 exploration includes ground-based induced polarization geophysical surveys over the western extension of Sebakwe zone, a new zone that appears to represent an unmined structure immediately north of the Premier deposit; Dilworth, an earlier staged deposit in the northern part of the Premier property; and Day Zone, an extension of the Big Missouri deposit.

Ascot Resources Ltd.

Construction of the tailings storage facility at Ascot's Premier gold mine project got underway in June.

"The 2023 exploration program has been steadily progressing, with encouraging results encountered in both the drilling program and the IP geophysics program," said White. "We anticipate starting to release exploration results in the coming weeks as we receive them."

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