May 27 2015
Benton Resources Inc. is pleased to announce that the Company has commenced its exploration program on the Staghorn Gold Property located in west-central Newfoundland which is under option from Metals Creek Resources Corp.
Under the option agreement, Benton can earn up to a 70% interest in the project. To earn the initial 60%, the Company must make cash payments of $50,000 over three years (includes $10,000 paid on signing) and issue 500,000 common shares of the Company (includes 100,000 issued on signing) and incur work expenditures in the amount of $500,000 over three years with $50,000 in work expenditures required by the first anniversary. Once a 60% interest is earned, either a 60/40 joint venture will be formed or Benton may elect to earn an additional 10% interest (70% in aggregate) by paying Metals Creek $50,000 and issue 500,000 common shares of the Company within 60 days of the third anniversary, and incur an additional $500,000 in expenditures on the property by the fifth anniversary.
Benton will focus its current efforts on discovering the source of the Ryan's Hammer ("RH") boulder train along the Cape Ray/Victoria Lake Fault Zone whereby Metals Creek discovered a high grade gold-bearing, granitic boulder train with assays ranging from trace to 32.15g/t Au. Benton will also follow up on a large high grade soil geochemical anomaly grading from trace amounts to 1690 parts per billion gold (ppb Au) in samples approximately 2.8km west of the RH area.
The Cape Ray/Victoria Lake regional fault zone hosts a number of gold deposits including Marathon Gold's Valentine Lake deposit, located 30km to the northeast and Benton's Cape Ray gold deposits approximately 100km to the southwest. The Staghorn Gold property covers a 29km strike length of the mineralized trend. Previous work had outlined a number of gold showings in the central and southwestern part of the property. This latest discovery is located in the northeast part of the property, in an area that has seen minimal previous exploration work and opens up a new prospective area for further exploration.
The RH boulders are angular to sub-angular altered and foliated granite containing variable amounts of pyrite and arsenopyrite. A total of 30 samples were collected from the numerous boulders which varied in size from 0.10m to 0.75m and have been traced over a 175m length. Assay results ranged from 11 ppb Au to 32,152 ppb Au (see Metals Creek press release dated November 18, 2014). In addition, Benton plans to complete metallurgical testing, prospecting, mapping, trenching and diamond drilling on the Woods Lake zone located 8km southwest of the RH showing where previous drilling intersected up to 2.14gpt Au over 16.1m including 6.18gpt over 5.11m (see Metals Creek press release December 3, 2009).
In addition, the Company would like to inform its shareholders that Nordmin Engineering has made its second cash payment of $125,000 to the Company pursuant to the option and joint venture agreement on the Cape Ray gold deposits and has now earned its initial 5% interest in the project.