Results from the most recent exploration release from the Cliff Creek South zone at Benchmark Metals' Lawyers project extended the total mineralized strike of the Cliff Creek area to over 1 km.
Drill highlights include:
102 metres of 1.44 g/t gold-equivalent;111 metres of 0.77 g/t gold-equivalent; and19.6 metres of 1.61 g/t gold-equivalent."The Cliff Creek South zone is providing the grade, consistency and continuity of gold and silver mineralization that we have also recognized at the main Cliff Creek zone," John Williamson, the company's CEO said in a release. "This new zone will be a focus of 2020 expansion and definition drilling,"
Of the eight holes completed on this zone, seven intercepted mineralization; all of the intercepts reported are from the first 330 metres of core.
Past intercepts from the Cliff Creek zone include 36.5 metres of 3.71 g/t gold-equivalent and 36.3 metres of 3.19 g/t gold-equivalent.
The wholly-owned, 127-sq.-km Lawyers project is located in the Golden Horseshoe district and produced 171,000 oz. of gold and 3.7 million oz. of silver historically with existing infrastructure at the site. Benchmark's model for the project is of a near-surface epithermal system with a potential link to a deeper porphyry system. There are currently six resource targets at the site which are near existing surface workings with additional prospects identified within a 20-km long trend.
Benchmark is planning on 100,000 metres of drilling at the project this year, to be followed by resource estimation work in the fourth quarter.
(This article first appeared in the Canadian Mining Journal)