Apr 26 2019
Auramex Resource Corp. reported that drill permitting is proceeding on its widespread Bear Pass Project in the Stewart Camp of British Columbia’s Golden Triangle. The 6,400 hectare project is situated on Highway 37A, 30 km northeast of Stewart.
Drill permitting is on-going and planning for drilling is a follow-on to a year’s efforts by the Auramex geological team. Collation of 100 years of historic exploration and production results set the groundwork for last year’s field program, which was carried out by a five-person geological team. That work detected a mineralizing system which is concluded to be the same age as that at the producing Brucejack Mine, 48 km to the north, and geologically close to that at the historic Silbak-Premier Mine, 20 km to the southwest. The system core known as the Bear Pass Pluton was inspected using isotopic age measurement and other methods and Auramex established that it is one of the Early Jurassic intrusions, with excellent potential to produce and host precious metal deposits and which are related to the majority of gold-silver mineralization in the Golden Triangle.
Beginning in the early 1900s, the Bear Pass has a long history of mining and exploration. Several gold-silver and base metal occurrences were investigated, with a number of them being developed into mines. In the initial days, access was by packhorse or on foot, so that only remarkably high-grade deposits were exploited. Exploration, of late, was inhibited by the fractured ownership, with titles to over 100 parcels being locked up in the form of Crown Grants from the early 1900s until lately. Auramex, spanning a 12-year period, secured much of the ground that was earlier covered by these Crown Grants, and in recent times augmented its holdings based on the evolving geological interpretation.
The implication of the Bear Pass Pluton was not recognized earlier due to this diverse, small-scale mineral tenure ownership; synchronized exploration was not possible between the various small parcels. Last year, the Auramex geological team, working under a cooperative exploration agreement with Mountain Boy Minerals, performed the first-ever full exploration program in the Bear Pass region. The acknowledgment of a Texas Creek intrusive unit is but one of the geological insights benefitted from that program.
The Auramex team also discovered a large zone of intense silica alteration and an even larger area of intense quartz + sericite ± pyrite alteration above the Bear Pass pluton, extending to the northeast beneath rapidly receding ice. These zones are interpreted as a lithocap above a very large intrusion-related hydrothermal system. The Bear Pass Pluton is now recognized as the likely heat engine for this system and the likely source of metals for the abundance of gold-silver occurrences around the Bear Pass. We are now focused on vectoring toward the core of this large and very robust system.
Dr. Paul Metcalfe, VP Exploration, Auramex.
The Auramex geological team continues to combine results of latest field work with historic data on four of its other projects – Tide North, Lower Bear, American Creek, and Georgie River – with additional drill programs likely to materialize as that work continues. Discussions are also on-going with possible joint venture partners concerning funding on a few of Auramex’ projects.
The technical disclosure in this news release has been reviewed and approved by Dr. Paul Metcalfe, PhD, P.Geo., a qualified person as stipulated in National Instrument 43-101.