Gold Resource eyes Isabella Pearl open pit expansion, new pit discovery at Scarlet and Civit Cat North West targets

Gold Resource Corporation (NYSEAMERICAN:GORO) said Tuesday that its Nevada Mining Unit’s exploration plans cover enlarging the Isabella Pearl open pit deposit by testing the high-potential, adjacent Civit Cat North West and Scarlet targets.

“The Isabella Pearl mine has a current estimated mine life of 4.5 years and we are optimistic we can add to that with the Civit Cat North and other targets,” Gold Resource Corporation CEO Jason Reid said in a statement.

It is not uncommon for numerous deposits to be located along the same mineralized trend, so Gold Resource is looking at its Scarlet and Civit Cat North West targets as having excellent potential of becoming additional open pit deposits.

READ: Gold Resource rises after announcing start of gold processing at Isabella Pearl project in Nevada

Open pit mining is a surface mining technique used to extract rock or minerals from the earth by removing them from an open pit.

“We know at least four historic open pit gold deposits operated south east along this same mineralized trend with the nearest one producing about 300,000 ounces of gold,” said Reid. “Isabella Pearl is the fifth deposit along trend. Our property position spans over six miles on trend to the north west with numerous areas of open pit potential beyond Scarlet and the Civit Cat North West target.”

Reid rated the exploration potential along the trend as “tremendous” and expected the company to be a “very long-term operator in the mining district.”

Scarlet begins approximately 100 meters north west of the Isabella Pearl project’s current planned pit boundary. Although limited historic third-party drill data exists in this area, the results are encouraging. Gold Resource has collected and assayed numerous surface samples at Scarlet with gold grades assaying as high as 9 grams per tonne gold. There is a consolidation of high-grade surface samples at Scarlet along the Pearl fault structure.

High potential targets

The high-grade surface samples are situated above and near the three historic drill holes at Scarlet, including 70.1 meters of 1.03 grams per tonne gold starting at 128 meters below the surface.

Initial exploration will focus on the south-eastern portion of the Scarlet target, which lies within the current permitted mine plan. This will reduce the number of permits required to bring additional mineral resources into production. The company plans to begin drilling this area once commercial production has kicked off at Isabella Pearl.

“Records from Scarlet of historic drill holes, including an intercept of 70 meters of 1 gram per tonne gold starting 128 meters below the surface, has the signatures of a potential deposit,” said Barry Devlin, vice president of exploration at Gold Resource Corporation. “Warrants additional exploration.”

Meanwhile, the Civit Cat North West target’s historic surface samples have reported grades as high as 9.70 grams per tonne gold.

A modest 2018 drill program testing the boundaries of the Isabella Pearl deposit increased year-end reserves by 22,200 gold ounces and increased the deposit’s average gold grade by 2.7% to 2.28 grams per tonne gold.

Looking to build on this, Civit Cat North is the next target for potential Isabella Pearl pit expansion, which is the northern extension of the Civit Cat trend. It is located within Isabella Pearl deposit’s northern boundary and currently hosts proven and probable reserves. Surface samples from the Civit Cat North target have reported grades as high as 2.1 grams per tonne gold.

Much of the early mine bench material in Civit Cat was estimated to be waste in the Isabella Pearl mine plan. However, a significant amount of this material has “shown economic mineralization” and has been delivered to “the heap leach pad for future gold extraction,” said the company.

Topographic constraints around Civit Cat North have limited its historic exploration drilling. With the upper portions of the pit shell now removed, there is better access to test the Civit Cat North target, pointed out the company.  

Gold Resource Corporation is a gold and silver producer, developer and explorer with operations in Oaxaca, Mexico and Nevada in the US.

Contact Uttara Choudhury at [email protected]

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Story by ProactiveInvestors