Florida Mountain Exploration Program At DeLamar Project
VANCOUVER - Integra Resources Corp. reported further exploration results from the 2020 Florida Mountain exploration program at the DeLamar Project, situated in Owyhee County in southwest Idaho. The drill results outlined today continue to underscore the strong exploration potential that exists in near-deposit targets at Florida Mountain.
“Florida Mountain continues to demonstrate potential for both low-grade, heap-leachable resource expansion as well as the potential for a high-grade resource below and within the existing NI 43-101 Resource Estimate. Drilling has intersected significant mineralization outside the known resource, potentially increasing the resource footprint by approximately 300 meters to the south. Drilling through the current resource envelope at Florida Mountain has also encountered multiple shoots of higher-grade material that could potentially positively affect the economics of the Project,” said, George Salamis, President and CEO.. “The hit-rate of high-grade gold and silver in drill sections outside of the known resource boundary, in the form of plunging shoots and vein extensions, is over 60 %, an impressive rate for exploration that validates the geological model developed by the exploration team. Furthermore, additional data from drilling at Florida Mountain continue to strengthen the geological model and controls of high-grade distribution and should result in continued drilling success.” Mr. Salamis continued, “The Company is also excited about the winter drill program in new areas such as Georgianna, where low-grade disseminated gold-silver mineralization and high-grade vein-type mineralization has been recently sampled at surface during the 2020 field exploration program. The Georgianna area, in particular, bears remarkable resemblance to the neighboring DeLamar Deposit situated 3 km to the southeast, with similar anomalous geophysical and soil geochemistry signatures and geological attributes.”
The intercepts reported consist of mineralization with wide-spread low-grade gold-silver values, crosscut and underlain by narrower high-grade, steeply dipping low-sulphidation quartz-adularia veins. Widespread intercepts from shallow oxide and transitional resource definition drilling conducted by Integra over the previous two years has confirmed potentially mineable widths and grades for these high-grade structures.
Integra’s exploration team has modeled 7 high-grade vein structures that appear similar in size and orientation to the historically productive high-grade Trade Dollar – Black Jack vein system. Most historic underground production stemmed from the Trade Dollar – Black Jack vein, while the remaining 6 veins saw limited production up until mining operations ceased with the start of World War I. Geometrically, the veins occur in the form of plunging shoots over an altitude difference of approximately 300 m below the apex of Florida Mountain. Strike lengths of the individual shoots tend to be 100 m to 200 m long and with widths of between 1 m and 8 m.
Integra refined its understanding of the controls on high-grade vein mineralization at Florida Mountain in early 2020 and has been using this model to specifically target the higher-grade “shoots” within the several vein systems identified to date. These higher-grade shoots are interpreted as being localized at the intersections of the North-Northwest and roughly East-West Trending fault/fracture systems. The deep intercepts on both the Stone Cabin / Tip Top and Alpine vein systems announced are situated within some of these structurally controlled high-grade shoots. The intercepts in drill hole FME-20-093 announced today indicate that the Stone Cabin / Tip Top vein systems appear to extend over 250 m south of previous drilling and the current resource boundary. Since 2018, Integra has drilled 20 drill holes at Florida Mountain that have specifically targeted high-grade shoots, with 13 significant intercepts to date. The success of current high-grade drill targeting at Florida Mountain lends increased confidence in the exploration model, and is a positive step towards the stated goal of defining a high-grade underground resource at Florida Mountain.
To date, less than 15% of the overall vein system strike length has seen targeted drill testing. The high-grade underground potential at Florida Mountain remains a high priority drill target, as underscored by results such as those released today. Further drilling is currently underway, testing additional high-grade vein continuity at Florida Mountain and, will continue throughout the winter for as long as weather and environmental conditions permit.
Three exploration drill rigs are currently in operation on the DeLamar Project at Florida Mountain, Milestone and the Georgianna/Blacksheep area. Drilling at Florida Mountain is focusing on exploration for high-grade vein mineralization at depth and along strike extensions to the shallow oxide/transitional near-surface stockwork mineralization. The two additional drill rigs are operating at Milestone and Georgianna. These areas have been the focus of heightened field activity in 2019 and 2020, where several large, untested soil geochemical and coincident geophysical anomalies were outlined. Approximately 3,000 m of drilling is scheduled to be drilled in the Blacksheep area over the next several months.