Westhaven Gold Corp. announced that exploration drilling has begun, on its flagship, high-grade 17,623-hectare Shovelnose Gold Property, which is situated 30 km south of Merritt, British Columbia, next to the Coquihalla Highway, and inside the potential Spences Bridge Gold Belt (SBGB).
Initial 2024 Drill Program. Image Credit: Westhaven Gold Corp.
On July 18th, 2023, a preliminary economic assessment, or “PEA,” was released from the South Zone, the first of six potential mineralization zones discovered at Shovelnose since 2018.
Using a gold price of $1800 per ounce, the PEA found a strong, low-cost, high-margin mining opportunity that would yield a post-tax IRR and NPV (6%), of 32.3% and $222 million, respectively. Further resource modeling on nearby discoveries that are close to the South Zone, such as at Franz and FMN, will be drill-tested in 2023.
About 4000 m of diamond drilling will be conducted at Shovelnose in the spring of 2024, mostly inside and along the highly potential Vein Zone One trend, which is 4 km long and has the South Zone deposit in addition to two more high-grade gold discoveries, Franz and FMN.
The program has commenced after obtaining a 5-year, 650-hole drilling permit. In addition to exploring Zone One trend targets, the drilling will assess various priority targets that have not been tested before, identified through sampling and prospecting efforts in 2023, along with a recently completed structural analysis.
Building on the success of our first PEA in 2023, Shovelnose remains an important anchor for our ongoing exploration efforts in the highly prospective and accessible Spences Bridge Gold Belt in 2024. Our aim with the spring program is to test newly identified structural targets, both proximal to the South Zone resource, as well as within the broader 4 km Vein Zone One trend, which is already host to several additional discoveries, but remains underexplored overall.
Gareth Thomas, President and Chief Executive Officer, Westhaven Gold Corp.
Initial Drill Targets
- FMN SE: Aimed at a possible extension of the recently found multi-meter high-grade gold-silver quartz vein mineralization found at FMN, which yielded results of 209.52 g/t silver (Ag) and 23.03 m of 37.24 g/t gold (Au), including 1.12 m of 294 g/t Au and 2,110 g/t Ag.
- MIK: Step-out drilling in 2023 produced 3.68 m of 17.61 g/t gold (Au) at the southernmost point of the 180 m long MIK Vein Zone.
- Line 6: Previous drilling encountered narrow breccia zones and quartz veinlets similar to those reported on the periphery of the South Zone, as well as low-grade gold mineralization in the rhyolite tuff unit. The prior drilling was probably parallel to a prospective feeder zone(s), given the orientation of the Vein Zone One trend. The possibility of a subterranean mineralization zone like the Vein Zone One trend will be investigated via drilling.
- HydBx2: Step-out drilling in the northwest to extend the structural contact carrying gold between the granodiorite basement to the east and the volcanic of the Spences Bridge Group to the west.
- Othello: Drilling to investigate the South Zone's possible offset extension as a recent structural analysis suggested.
- South Zone Extension (West): Assessing a drill gap on the western border of the South Zone for the possibility of increased mineralization; drilling here will also test for additional structurally hosted veining.