New Mineralized Corridor Through Drilling At Champagne Project
TORONTO - Idaho Champion Gold Mines Canada Inc. has identified a new mineralized Corridor, at the Champagne Gold Project near the city of Arco, Butte County, Idaho. It is located on the high priority anomalous drill target area to the north-west of the past producing open pits and covers approximately 800 meters north-south and 300 meters east-west. Drill core for holes one (1) through four (4) have been sent to the lab for assay and Champion is currently cutting and logging holes five (5) through seven (7) with a total of 2,900 meters drilled to date.
"The targets for the 2021 drill program are the displaced roots of the multiple veins of the Mine Hill polymetallic (Ag, Pb-Zn-Ag, and Cu-Ag) system and also nearby vuggy silica sheeted breccias mined for Au-Ag at the North and South Pits," said, Chief Geologist, Rob Kell. "The characteristics of the vein system and sheeted breccia are typical of high sulfidation epithermal deposits sourced from a porphyry copper intrusion at greater depth. The 2020 drilling determined that the vein system and breccias at Mine Hill were cut off at shallow depth by a detachment fault. The follow-up IP survey identified a large chargeability anomaly positioned 800 meters to the west of Mine Hill. Testing the near-surface parts of this IP anomaly is a key component of our strategy for 2021.
Drill holes DDH-CC-21-02, 03, and 06 intercepted a corridor of moderately to strongly altered andesitic volcanics and tuffaceous rocks, dominantly clay- and/or quartz-sericite-pyrite (QSP) alteration. Quartz-latite porphyry dikes also crosscut the volcanic rocks. Thick sections host disseminated sulfides in intervals up to 300 meters in total width. Hydrothermal alteration is seen to increase in intensity with depth. In total, this corridor of alteration, veining, and brecciation extends for over 800m in a north-south direction and is up to 300m wide.
These holes also encountered intervals of fracture veinlets and narrow veins of pyrite, galena, sphalerite, chalcopyrite, and dark grey sulfosalts that crosscut the volcanic rocks and the porphyry dikes. DDH-CC-21-03 passed through a more significant vein, possibly the St. Louis Vein at 63 meters depth, which consists of subequal amounts of pyrite and sulfosalts. Deeper parts of the vein systems appear to be zoned towards silver-copper rather than lead-zinc minerals. While assays are pending, semi-quantitative analysis by field-portable X-ray fluorescence (XRF) indicated that the veins are enriched in silver, lead, zinc, and copper.
Drilling has confirmed that alteration and veining do continue into the rocks that underly the caldera and volcanic rocks. Several narrow (but significant) veins composed entirely of sulfide and sulfosalt mineralization were also intersected in the hornfelsed "basement" siliciclastic sedimentary rocks. Hornfels alteration is formed by contact metamorphism from higher temperature rocks, which could indicate the presence of more porphyritic rocks at depth.