A second rig is now on site to accelerate growth of this discovery. Pic via Getty Images.
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Drilling at Sunstone Metals’ Limon target, within the Bramaderos Project in Southern Ecuador, has intersected further visible gold in an epithermal vein system at 600m below surface.
The interval in hole LMDD020 is ~700m away and geologically similar to hole LMDD017, which returned 177m at 1.1g/t AuEq from surface.
The company says the result has ‘significantly’ expanded the search space for the epithermal system with two drilling rigs now focused on defining the scale of “what appears to be a large epithermal system, overlying or adjacent to a porphyry gold-copper system.”
Assays are expected in early-mid May.
Sunstone Metals (ASX:STM) MD Malcolm Norris said he expects to increase both the tonnes and grade of the Exploration Target for Bramaderos – which is currently between 3.3Moz and 8.6Moz AuEq within 255 to 360Mt at a grade between 0.40 and 0.74g/t AuEq.
“Limon is emerging as a major gold discovery,” he said.
“This could have very significant ramifications for the total resource, the overall grade and the upfront development options at Bramaderos.
“We stand by our objective of discovering a 10Moz gold district with multiple deposits within 4km of one another.”
The Limon target area is 2.7km from the Brama-Alba gold-copper deposit, that hosts a porphyry gold-copper-silver Mineral Resource of 2.7Moz AuEq – and Norris said it could be a large epithermal system in its own right.
“We are seeing geologically similar styles of mineralisation over a vertical distance of at least 600m, and it is open laterally,” he said.
“This greatly expands our area of exploration and increases our confidence that we are onto something significant at Limon.”
A 2,200m drilling program was planned as follow-up to LMDD017 results, and this program has commenced and will now be expanded to drill targets developed as a consequence of the presence of visible gold in LMDD020 at 665m down hole.
There are now two rigs on site, with one completing hole LMDD020, targeting a porphyry gold-copper system at depth and the other testing the “phenomenal” results from LMDD017, Norris said.
“We are preparing samples from LMDD020 for submission to the assay laboratory and we will fast track selected intervals,” he added.
This article was developed in collaboration with Sunstone Metals Limited, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.
This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.
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