The Terra Mine shut down because of low silver prices. Some ore was left in the stopes, and no exploration was conducted in the last year to maintain the ore reserves.
The previous high-grade veins are an interesting target, and a proven commodity at Terra. The kicker is that there is an exciting possibility that the copper-rich pods, breccias, and disseminations in the iron-oxide rich alterations represent "Olympic-dam" type finger prints.
The Great Bear Magmatic Zone (GBMZ) is known to host Olympic-dam style mineralization. Both Terra and Fortune Mineral's Nico property, as well as MGR/Alberta Star's Longtom property are hosted in the GBMZ. I would suggest that people read LOM's research report by Judy Baker on Fortune Minerals Limited for a concise review of this type of deposit.
Fortune Minerals' Nico property at Mazenod Lake had been staked and explored several times in the past. It's not that people didn't know there was mineralization there, it's just they didn't recognize all the clues were indicating something larger. On Nico, it was well known that there was high-grade arsenopyrite-rich copper+cobalt+bismuth+gold-bearing veins, with disseminated mineralization in the vicinity. This was spread out over several hundred meters as a bit here, a bit there, accompanied by extensive iron-oxide accumulations.
Terra is known to host high-grade silver+bismuth+cobalt+copper veins in an area of abundant disseminations and pods of copper+gold mineralization, all associated with very extensive iron-oxide enrichments. The setting of sediment host rocks for the high-grade veins, and volcanic and sediment host rocks for the copper+gold disseminations, pods and breccias is very similar to Nico.
Dave |
