Titan flags ‘significant’ porphyry potential in Ecuador

Titan has outlined a significantly larger gold-copper porphyry system for exploration at its Linderos project in Ecuador after relogging historical holes.

The compilation and verification of historical results has identified multiple prospects with mineralisation intersected in previous drilling at the advanced stage Copper Ridge, Meseta Gold Camp and Loma Alta Gold prospects.

Additionally, the early-stage Victoria prospect highlights a similar footprint of alteration as Copper Ridge along with favourable surface geochemistry that Titan Minerals (ASX:TTM) says requires follow-up exploration.

Managing director Laurie Marsland says that while the company remains focused on delivering the JORC resource for its Dynasty gold project, it was also working on its other assets as it continues to build Ecuador’s next mining development company.

“Linderos is a large landholding, hosting both high grade gold and bulk tonnage copper potential associated with a significant outcropping, high tenor copper anomalism,” he added.

“The recent discovery is located within the extensive alteration halo of the Miocene aged porphyry system where exploration work is in its infancy.

“We plan to systematically explore Linderos and to discover what appears to be a high-grade epithermal gold project sitting on a porphyry. We are all excited about the potential we see at Linderos.”

titan — Regional scale geology of the Linderos Project Area and prospect location map. Pic: Supplied

Linderos Project

The Linderos Project is situated within a corridor of mineralisation extending from Peru through northern Ecuador that is associated with early to late Miocene aged intrusions.

While most porphyry copper and epithermal gold deposits in southern Ecuador are associated with magmatism in this age range, several younger intrusions are located along the margin of the extensive Cretaceous-aged Tangula Batholith.

This forms a favourable structural and metallogenic corridor for intrusion activity where the company holds a significant land position.

Titan’s review of historical results has returned intersections such as 28.8m grading 2.56 grams per tonne (g/t) gold including 5.94m at 10.8g/t gold and 8.88m at 4.7g/t gold at within the epithermal gold targets at Meseta and Loma Alta.

Additionally, the tenor of porphyry mineralisation at Copper Ridge improves with depth with three of the five historical holes ending in mineralisation.

These returned results such as 99.75m at 0.26% copper from a depth of 225m with 19.3m at 0.39% at the end of hole, and 84.85m at 0.32% copper from surface including 19.95m at 0.45% copper from 25.5m.

Exploration plans

The company recently started exploration at Linderos with planned heli-borne geophysics, and ground-induced polarisation geophysical surveys expected to be completed over the next four months.

Current work is focused on advancing the project to diamond drilling during the second half of this year.

Copper Ridge and Meseta are the focus of current exploration with previous work highlighting the potential for high-grade gold near surface ready for immediate drill targeting within the Meseta gold camp.

Broad alteration and extensive lower grade gold mineralisation associated with the high-grade gold intercepts at Meseta also demonstrates that further drilling of gold targets in the near term will support efforts to assess the scale of the Copper Ridge porphyry target.

This article was developed in collaboration with Titan Minerals, 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.