Alexandria Minerals Corporation is pleased to provide an update of its activities, including the start-up of drilling on the western half of its 35 km long Cadillac Break property package in Val d'Or, Quebec, where the company is testing a portion of a 7 km long copper-gold trend in and around the contact zone of the Center Post granitic stock.
Upcoming Exploration Activities
Alexandria is beginning a 2,500 m drill campaign on its Ducros-Oramaque-Orenada properties to test for Cu-Au mineralization along the 7 km long Cu-Au trend which have had reported historical drill hole assays of 91.4 m grading 0.37% Cu, including 26.2 m grading 0.93% Cu, in hole D69-01 and 150.3 m grading 0.27% Cu, and 7.32 g/t Au over 1.5 m, in hole D69-12.
Following Alexandria's discovery of the Akasaba West Zone Cu-Au deposit in 2012 and its resource estimate in 2013, Alexandria geologists began placing greater emphasis on Au-Cu-Mo targets similar to that at the West Zone, with focus on the western half of its Cadillac Break property group in Val d'Or.
Previous drilling by Alexandria along this zone before the winter freeze-up yielded assays of 170m grading 0.12% Cu and 0.06g/t Au, with local higher concentrations of 0.31% Cu and 0.06g/t Au over 12m and 0.12% Cu and 0.11g/t Au over 39m (DDH DAX-14-01). These assays reflect the broad stockwork-like copper sulfide mineralization observed in the granitic and adjacent volcanic rocks in the drill core. The boggy conditions prevented testing of Alexandria's principal targets which can be tested now that the ground is frozen.
Recent Exploration Developments on Akasaba
At Akasaba, drilling in the latter half of 2014 was focused on testing 3 principal targets: 1) down plunge below the resources in the Akasaba Mine area; 2) along strike to the east of the Akasaba Mine (Kettle Zone); and 3) the North Zone, approximately 100 m north of the Akasaba Mine. All targets consisted Induced Polarization ("IP") anomalies together with, in the case of the Akasaba Mine area and the North Zone, coincident gold mineralization.
Drill holes tested a 1,000 m long IP anomaly on the Kettle Zone, located about 600 east of the Akasaba Mine. The geology encountered in the drill holes is consistent with a Volcanogenic Massive Sulfide ("VMS") environment: namely, interbedded felsic tuffs and lapilli tuff, chert, black shale, widespread pyrite and pyrrhotite with local sphalerite, and, notably, a 0.8 meter wide layer of massive pyrrhotite, all along strike with the hanging wall dacite of the Akasaba Mine. Some of the assays received include: 0.5g/t Au / 0.7m in DDH IAX-14-257 and 2.31g/t Au and 0.11% Zn over 1.1m and 0.58g/t Au over 1m in DDH IAX-14-258.
These important finds add further evidence of Alexandria's view of the potential for VMS (Cu-Zn-Au-Ag) targets on its Cadillac Break property package, further bolstered by the nearby location of the formerly producing world-class Louvicourt Mine, a VMS deposit, which produced 15.9 million tonnes of sulfide ore, grading 3.36% Cu, 1.66% Zn, 0.9 g/t Au and 26.75 g/t Ag. The design of Alexandria's future exploration program will take into consideration these results.
At the North Zone, wide gold mineralization, with anomalous copper mineralization, was encountered in testing geophysical targets, including the following:
- IAX-11-152: 0.49 g/t Au over 51.0m including 6.28 g/t Au over 1.5m
- IAX-10-109: 0.63 g/t Au over 16.7m
- IAX-12-207: 0.32 g/t Au over 25.2m
The above results demonstrate that the Akasaba gold-copper system is extensive. Company geologists are accordingly reviewing next steps in the Akasaba area. As part of this planning, the Company is undertaking a property-wide CARDS study provided by Diagnos of Montreal, which statistically evaluates geophysical and geochemical data to aid in drill hole targeting.