Mandorin continues to expand gold exploration
Mandorin Goldfields Inc
MGD
Shares issued 42,541,228
Jun 4 2002 close $.050
Wednesday Jun 5 2002
News Release
Mr. Malcolm Stevens reports
MANDORIN GOLDFIELDS INC. - ANNOUNCEMENT
Gold exploration
The company's gold strategy continues with expansion of its gold exploration
under its arrangements with Independence Gold Mining Zimbabwe Private Ltd.
(Indepgold), the Zimbabwe gold production arm of the U.K.-based Lonmin Plc.
In addition, management continues to seek out gold investment opportunities in
North America and Australia.
Tafuna Hills project
Indepgold has advised the company that the extensive elluvial and alluvial deposits
surrounding the company's gold leases on Tafuna Hills are to be evaluated with a
view to designing and operating a suitably sized mining operation.
A small testing plant is currently being sourced, capable of bulk testing the
deposits which are known to contain significant, but as yet unquantified, amounts
of free gold.
It is proposed to assess the deposits, which are known to thicken from 0.5 to five
metres thick at 300 metres from the hill proper, by bulk sampling and processing
via a scrubbing plant, Knelson concentrator and gold table.
A scoping study is in progress to establish a pilot plant scale mining operation
within the company's leases in Tafuna Hills. Initially it is proposed to mill and
process the known resources of oxidized ore from a number of outcropping
quartz reefs. It is anticipated that the operation will provide a positive cash flow to
finance further drilling and ultimately mine scale development of the company's
potential resources.
Tafuna Hills has a recent history of gold mining dating back to 1905 when the first
mine, the Joker mine, was established on ancient workings that extended to a
depth of 30 metres on a quartz reef. The Joker mine is recorded as being the
richest of all the mines on the hill with a total official output of 933 kilograms of
gold at an average grade recovered of 34.6 grams per tonne (g/t).
During the last century, up to 1977, some 11 small mines on Tafuna officially
produced around seven tonnes of gold at an average recovery of 12.2 g/t. All of
the old mines closed due to a lack of capital and equipment.
The company believes that the combination of favourable geology and known
mineralization exploited in the past provide evidence that the property has good
potential for hosting undiscovered gold resources in multiple shear-related
quartz/carbonate reefs.
Considering the size of the system, it is also possible that disseminated auriferous
sulphide-associated deposits may also be discovered.
Further regional scale exploration has been completed within the company's
exploration tenements in Zimbabwe.
Mullingar project
Recent and continuing programs have focused upon the Mullingar project area
where a broad area of highly sheared and altered pyritic Shamvaian
metasediments is associated with a strong gold in-soil geochemical signature and
numerous coincident zones of high apparent chargeability and resistivity.
Exploration results indicate that the Shamvaian sediments within EPO 1072, and in
particular within the area now under detailed investigation, offer the potential for
establishing a bulk mineable resource.
Interest within the area was based, originally, upon results of a helicopter magnetic
and radiometric survey conducted by the company over an area of 20.5 square
kilometres. Analysis of the data indicated hot spots of intense potassic alteration
subsequently found to relate to broad gold in-soil anomalies, defined by one of the
previous EPO holders. The soil sampling program covered an area of 790
hectares of pyritized metasedimentary units and mineralized and sheared porphyry
intrusives.
It has long been recognized that considerable potential exists to delineate
disseminated gold mineralization in felsic volcaniclastic sequences in late Archaean
terrain proximal to subvolcanic felsic porphyry stocks.
Within this environment, target areas may be further defined by the presence of
disseminated iron sulphides, pronounced silicification and zones of potassium
metasomatism. Evidence of carbonation is also expected.
These criteria are entirely consistent with observations within the Mullingar
prospect area and in the Shamva mine environment, located some 18 kilometres
to the west in the same greenstone belt, and within similar metasedimentary
sequences and related porphyries.
Most recently, the company has completed a second-phase soil geochemical
survey program over an area of 78 hectares to test the quality of previous data.
This was followed up with a 559-metre trenching and continuous channel sampling
program. Results from this program have confirmed the highly anomalous levels of
gold, defined initially by the soil sampling program within the heavily altered
sediments. Shears both within the sediments and porphyry are commonly well
mineralized with sulphides, predominantly pyrite with minor chalcopyrite, and
associated gold.
Results from one trench across a porphyry/sediment were:
Inter- ppm
val gold Geology
(m)
0-3 0.32 Silicified porphyry with
disseminated pyrite
3-4 5.55 Porphyry/sediment contact
4-7 0.29 Sheared limonitic porphyry
7-8 1.95 Sheared limonitic porphyry
8-47 0.17 Variably sheared,
silicified and mineralized
sediments
47-49 4.66 Strongly sheared and
mineralized sediments
49-63 0.18 Strongly sheared and
mineralized sediments
Mullingar may represent the highest level of an Archaean gold system where
low-pressure boiling-off of the hydrothermal fluids could explain the broad
pervasive zones of alteration and mineralization within the low-grade metamorphic
environment. High background levels of gold with gold spikes would be consistent
with this model, particularly where there is strong evidence, as there is, of
sulphidization, silicification, potassium metasomatism and carbonation.
Although only a small number of the geochemical, and coincident geophysical,
anomalies have been the subject of detailed follow-up programs, the company
considers that the targets already defined should be drilled at this stage of the
program.
A contractor for a one- to 2000-metre, NQ-size, diamond drilling program is
currently being sought.
Shamva mine region
In the vicinity of the Shamva mine, a multiphase deformational zone associated
with late Archaean deep-seated regional shearing and a subvolcanic porphyry
body is being investigated.
The area hosts strike conformable porphyry bodies along the
Shamvaian/Bulawayan contact with mineralization within the sediments and the
porphyry. Mineralization is associated with zones of alteration, coincident with
structural lineaments, and deformation of the regional magnetic high located within,
or adjacent to, the porphyry. A one- to two-metre-wide shear related auriferous
quartz vein, paralleling the regional strike, occurs within the porphyry.
Two lines of induced polarization, one kilometre apart, over the geological
contacts indicated a strong apparent chargeability zone associated with a zone of
low resistivity. The anomaly, which lies over a set of north-northeast trending
lineaments that parallel the regional trend, is located immediately south of the main
magnetic high trend and lies entirely within greenstones close to the porphyry
contact.
A 75-metre-long trench dug across the zone of interest exposed basaltic
greenstones with minor quartz veins (up to 10 centimetres thick), some folded
pegmatitic zones and a mafic dike. The area is generally sheared and highly
oxidized. The trench has been channel sampled, at one-metre intervals. The assay
results have not been received to date.
Selected horizons of ferruginous quartzite which lie within the Bulawayan
formation in the greenstone belt, close to the contact with the overlying Shamvaian
sediments, are being investigated to assess their potential for high tonnage,
low-grade, open-cut, heap leachable material. The beds are near vertical,
generally five to nine metres in width and are flanked by dense and apparently
non-mineralized basalts. Feldspar porphyries are exposed in some areas.
The zones which are primarily of interest are heavily fractured, gossanous and
laminated, more or less horizontally. Due to the fracturing and lamination, they are
particularly difficult to sample and results, prior to drilling, are at best indicative.
A number of small mines have operated within one of the quartzite belts over a
strike of 4.5 kilometres. Records are sparse; however, one mine, operated around
1946, recorded a small production of 31 kilograms of gold from 19,443 tonnes at
an average recovery (by gravity) of 1.6 g/t.
Recent sampling within one of the old pits returned 3.45 parts per million (ppm)
over nine metres, including 9.08 over two metres. Grades are commonly highest
near the hanging wall contact and thereafter range between one and 2.5 ppm.
Grab samples along strike from the pit were, however, low, around 0.2 ppm,
suggesting that the mineralization may be highly discontinuous along strike,
necessitating a substantial drilling program.
VMS exploration
Empress joint venture
A stream sediment sampling program has recently been completed within EPO
1073 covering ground highly prospective as a host for VMS deposits. Areas
previously examined along strike contained a number of gossanous horizons,
electromagnetic conductors and copper and zinc soil anomalies.
The survey covered 5.45 square kilometres of greenstone belt, wherein a number
of strong electromagnetic conductors, open along strike, have been identified from
airborne electromagnetic survey data. The survey was relatively detailed for a first
pass with a density of 15 sample sites per square kilometre. The samples have
been submitted to a local laboratory where they are to be screened to -80 mesh
and analyzed for copper, zinc and gold.
Eight copper claims covering an area of 973 hectares and seven kilometres of
strike have been applied for within the EPO covering a number of gossans, the
felsic volcanic horizon and the electromagnetic conductors within the greenstone
belt.
The Empress joint venture agreement is being amended such that no further funds
are required from the partners prior to Sept. 30, 2002.
North America
Preliminary discussions have begun with potential joint venture partners for the
acquisition of mineral areas in North America.
(c) Copyright 2002 Canjex Publishing Ltd. canada-stockwatch.com
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