Oro Silver drills 5.9 m of 166.3 g/t Ag at El Compas
2010-01-15 08:30 ET - News Release
Mr. Darren Bahrey reports
ORO SILVER INTERSECTS HIGH GRADE MINERALIZATION; 19.95 G/T GOLD AND 166.3 G/T SILVER OVER 5.9 METRES AT EL COMPAS PROJECT, ZACATECAS, MEXICO
Oro Silver Resources Ltd. has received more positive assay results for two additional drill holes on the El Orito target located on its El Compas property near the city of Zacatecas, Mexico. The drill holes were designed to test the potential for high-grade gold and silver mineralization in the central portion of the El Orito target area at shallow depths. Highlights from these latest two drill holes include:
19.95 grams per tonne (g/t) gold and 166.3 g/t silver over 5.9 metres in drill hole 09COM048 located approximately 60 metres below surface;
1.08 g/t gold and 16.2 g/t silver over 3.3 metres, including 4.05 g/t gold and 93.5 g/t silver over 0.4 metre in drill hole 09COM047 located approximately 50 metres below surface.
Darren Bahrey, president and chief executive officer of Oro Silver, commented, "We are very pleased with the results of these latest drill holes as they have extended the known mineralization extent to more shallow areas we had not tested before, growing the overall size of the El Orito gold-silver vein system."
The El Orito target is a recent discovery which is located 300 metres east of the El Compas mine entrance (where Oro Silver recently reported an intercept of 193 g/t gold and 1,264 g/t silver over 4.3 metres, see news in Stockwatch on Nov. 10, 2009). The focus of the current drilling is to continue expanding the El Orito vein target, which is anticipated to have a significant impact on increasing the company's NI-43-101 resource at El Compas. Recent drilling has nearly doubled the strike length of the El Orito vein to approximately 350 metres, and more drilling is being programmed to potentially extend the gold and silver mineralization to the south and at depth.
Hole 48 (09COM048) was drilled in the central mineralized portion of the El Orito target in between and up dip (more shallow) of holes 08COM026 and 09COM046, and 80 metres north of hole 47. Hole 48 intersected a vein zone from 54.5 to 72.9 metres downhole containing several veins with banded and bladed textures. Most of the veins contain minor black silver sulphide, as well as fine-grained native gold.
Hole 47 (09COM047) was drilled in the central mineralized portion of the El Orito target between and up dip (more shallow) of holes 09COM041 and 09COM046. Hole 47 intersected a vein zone from 59.2 to 70.4 metres downhole containing multiple quartz veins with banded and bladed textures. Some of the veins contain fine blebs of disseminated black silver sulphide, and more rarely fine-grained native gold.
In summary, the El Orito target comprises one or more subparallel, near vertically dipping quartz veins with individual veins ranging from a half metre to several metres wide. The mineralized portion of the vein system is approximately 350 metres in length and strikes roughly north-south. High-grade gold and silver mineralization in the veins occurs at a shallow depth down to a vertical depth of about 125 metres. The potential is good for the El Orito vein system to expand along strike and at depth.
Nineteen drill holes for a total of 2,268 metres were completed at El Compas between June and December, 2009, as part of the continuing 5,000-metre drill program. Assay results for holes 09COM49 to 56 are still pending and will be released once they have been received and interpreted.
Select assay results of the recently drilled holes at the El Orito vein target are summarized in the table.
Hole From (m) To (m) Core length(i) (m) Gold (g/t) Silver (g/t)
09COM047 43.6 43.9 0.3 4.80 119.9
and 59.2 60.7 1.5 0.81 22.2
and 67.0 70.4 3.4 1.08 16.2(ii)
includes 67.0 67.7 0.7 2.50 22.4
includes 70.0 70.4 0.4 4.05 93.5
09COM048 54.4 60.3 5.9 19.95 166.3(ii)
includes 54.4 55.6 1.2 81.19 654.4
includes 59.6 60.3 0.7 30.72 308.6
and 63.1 65.4 2.3 1.33 22.7
and 68.7 72.9 4.2 1.09 24.0(ii)
(i) The core length represents down hole length and is not true width.
(ii) Silver assay results that are still pending for this interval were
assigned zero g/t grade.
Assay results for the 2009 drilling program at both El Orito and El Compas target areas are showing a higher proportion of samples with high- to very-high-grade gold when compared with drilling results from the period 2007 to 2008. Many of these more recent high-grade sample intervals contain visible, native gold indicating that a "nugget effect" may be leading to the underreporting of gold values. For this reason metallic analysis is being performed on all samples containing visible gold and/or returning greater than five g/t Au by gravimetric method. The results of the metallic analyses will be compiled and released in a summary report once all results have been received and interpreted.
Oro Silver's project development programs are supervised by Thomas Bagan, PEng, chief operating officer and vice-president operations. Mr. Bagan is a qualified person as defined by National Instrument 43-101 and has reviewed the content of this press release.
The objective of this year's drilling at the El Compas and El Orito vein targets is to accomplish the following:
To increase the near-surface gold and silver resource;
To test for deeper potential high-grade silver and gold feeder vein structures;
To provide additional geological information for the in-house scoping study.
Studies being completed at El Compas to aid in prioritizing vein targets to be drill-tested include the following:
Induced polarization and magnetic surveys over the El Compas mine and other known vein targets to determine if a geophysical signature of the defined high-grade vein zones occur;
Surface and underground structural mapping;
Clay sample spectral analysis and satellite ASTER image interpretation to confirm the presence of buddingtonite -- a mineral known to be associated with silver and gold mineralization in the Zacatecas silver belt.
The potential for deeper high-grade silver and gold feeder structures in the El Compas district is based on the results of surface exploration work completed to date and a prior drill intercept that intersected a quartz vein grading 703 g/t silver and 4.1 g/t gold over 0.9 metre at a vertical depth of 425 metres below surface, located approximately one kilometre southeast of the El Compas mine entrance. Preliminary geophysical results look encouraging in identifying structures at depth which may host high-grade silver mineralization; final interpretations are still pending. |
