More info for you on diamonds in Alberta
The Northern Miner Volume 82 Number 48 January 27,
1997
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THE DIAMOND PAGE -- Ashton and Pure Gold drill for diamonds in
Alberta
VANCOUVER
Partners Ashton Mining of Canada (ACA-T) and Pure Gold Resources (PUG-T) have
launched a drill program aimed at uncovering diamonds in the north-central part of
Alberta,
northeast of Grande Prairie.
The diamond drilling effort will test a series of 10 isolated geophysical anomalies, which
Ashton
President John Auston says exhibit all the characteristics of kimberlite pipes.
The joint venture covers a land package of 3.3 million acres in the Buffalo Hills area.
Under an option agreement with an Alberta energy firm, Pure Gold is funding the first
$500,000 in
return for a 15% interest in the project. Ashton, the operator, can earn a 42.5%
interest by funding
the next $5 million.
Past work by Monopros identified the Mountain Lake kimberlitic stock intrusive.
"It's an area where the basement rocks are overlain by a fair thickness of young
sediments," says
Auston. "These anomalies look as if they are pipes that have punched up through the
young
sediments." Recent sampling by the Alberta Geological Survey recovered a large
number of pyrope
garnets in two glacial till samples from a site in the extensive joint-ventured ground.
Unlike the Northwest Territories, where the glacial till is generally thin, the Buffalo Hills
area features
glaciation that is complex. Also, whereas, in the Territories, sampling has proved
effective in tracing
indicator minerals back to source, in the joint-ventured area overburden depths range
from 100 to
200 ft., making it difficult to determine the source.
Nonetheless, the presence of garnets suggests that some of the pipe-like anomalies
could be
diamondiferous, Auston says.
In related news, Troymin Resources (TYR-A) has acquired 1.3 million acres of ground
in the
immediate area.
Farther south, in the Hinton area, Kennecott Canada has started drilling on ground held
through
various joint ventures with Montello Resources (MEO-A), New Claymore Resources
(NCS-V)
and Troymin.
Kennecott has spent the past 18 months completing follow-up ground magnetic
surveys on 147
airborne targets. Twenty-one of these anomalies are targeted for drilling.
In total, 24 diamonds and numerous indicator minerals have been recovered from
stream-sediment
sampling. Kennecott says it is encouraged by the presence of diamonds and diamond
indicator
minerals in the streams, coupled with the occurrence of nearby discrete magnetic
anomalies.
Magnetic modelling suggests that the source of the magnetic anomalies will be fewer
than 50 metres
from surface.
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