Metallic Minerals Defines 985 Million Pounds of Copper Equivalent in Inaugural NI 43-101 Mineral Resource Estimate for the La Plata Project in Colorado, USA
VANCOUVER, BC / ACCESSWIRE / April 26, 2022 / Metallic Minerals (TSXV:MMG)(OTCQB:MMNGF) ("Metallic Minerals", , or the "Company") is pleased to announce the first National Instrument 43-101 ("NI 43-101") mineral resource estimate (the "2022 Resource Estimate") on the Company's La Plata project, which focuses on the central Allard copper-silver porphyry deposit. The Company acquired the project in 2019 and with confirmatory drilling and sampling has quickly generated a NI 43-101 compliant resource estimate consisting of 115.7 million tonnes at an average grade of 0.39% copper equivalent ("Cu Eq") (0.35% Cu and 4.02 g/t Ag) using a 0.25% Cu Eq cut-off grade.
The Allard deposit remains open to significant expansion within the resource area. In addition, the greater La Plata silver-gold-copper project remains underexplored and open to new discoveries of both additional copper porphyry centers as well as high-grade epithermal silver and gold systems. A robust campaign of follow-up drilling and geophysical surveys is planned for the project in 2022 with the objective of expanding the 2022 Resource and advancing new targets.
[Blockierte Grafik: https://www.accesswire.com/users/newswire/images/698870/image-1.png]
Metallic Minerals will host a live webinar on Wednesday April 27th at 10am PT (1pm ET) to discuss the 2022 Resource, current activities, and upcoming plans for the La Plata and Keno Silver projects. To register, click here or the thumbnail.
Highlights
- Inferred mineral resources at the Allard deposit total 889 million pounds of copper and 14.975 million ounces of silver in a constrained model with 115.7 million tonnes at an average grade of 0.39% Cu Eq (0.35% Cu and 4.02 g/t Ag) using a 0.25% Cu Eq cut-off grade (see Table 1).
- The 2022 Resource Estimate area incorporates a single porphyry intrusive-hosted sulphide system that is drill defined over a kilometer ("km") in length, 400 meters (m) in width and to a kilometer of vertical extent and remains open to expansion in all directions. The resource area shows strong spatial correlation with large-scale anomalies in geophysics and metal in soil values, providing a compelling basis for expansion of the 2022 Resource Estimate and for potential new discoveries in future drill campaigns.
- The 2022 Resource Estimate was completed by SGS Geological Services ("SGS") and is based on 56 diamond core drill holes, totalling 15,200 meters completed by Rio Tinto, Freeport and others along with new drilling and underground sampling by Metallic Minerals.
- Exploration activities by Metallic Minerals in 2020 and 2021 included 1,980 meters of core drilling, resampling of historical drill core, underground sampling from the Allard deposit, airborne and ground-based geophysics and surface sampling across the broader property.
- Drilling highlights at the Allard porphyry system include 395 m grading 0.57% copper equivalent (0.51% Cu, 6.3 g/t Ag and 0.017 g/t Au) in LP-03, and 854 m at 0.26% Cu, including 254 m grading 0.41% Cu, in drill hole LP-01. Both drill holes started and ended in mineralization (see Figure 1).
- In addition to the 2022 Resource Estimate, which remains fully open to expansion at depth and along strike, 16 untested potential porphyry centers have been identified on the greater La Plata project area, as well as target areas with potential for significant high-grade epithermal silver and gold.
Scott Petsel, Metallic Minerals' President, states, "This inaugural resource is a major milestone for Metallic Minerals and the La Plata project and puts us on the map in the U.S. with a new resource containing important base and precious metals, that fall under the US government's critical minerals strategy, in a past-producing yet underexplored district in the southwestern U.S. With 15 million ounces of silver and nearly a billion pounds of copper, at recent metal prices of over $25/oz silver and $4.50/lb copper, the Company has demonstrated the exceptional value opportunity of the La Plata project for Metallic Minerals shareholders."
Mr. Petsel continued, "We feel this is just the start for us at La Plata and it validates our strategy of identifying and acquiring high-quality district-scale assets during lows in the metal price cycle and applying modern, systematic exploration techniques as a means of value creation. This is also the process we are seeing to fruition at our high-grade Keno Silver property in the Yukon, Canada. Work at La Plata in 2022 will focus on expanding this new resource and testing new priority target areas for porphyry and high-grade silver and gold mineralization."
The 2022 Resource Estimate will be incorporated into an NI 43-101-compliant technical report for the La Plata project which will be available within 45 days.
Table 1 - La Plata Inferred Mineral Resource Estimate at a Base Case Cut-off Grade of 0.25% CuEq with Grade and Contained Metal Sensitivity Analysis at Various CuEq Cut-off Grades.
...
![[smilie_happy]](https://2023a.goldseiten-forum.com/wcf/images/smilies/smilie_happy_058.gif "smilie_happy"){kind=small}
