Ivanhoe Mines to commence drilling on the Tiger Hills gold and silver project, Inner Mongolia, China
04 Mai 2005 - 3:30PM
PR Newswire (US)
Ivanhoe Mines to commence drilling on the Tiger Hills gold and
silver project, Inner Mongolia, China BEIJING, China, May 4
/PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Ivanhoe Mines' Executive Vice President,
Exploration, Douglas Kirwin announced today that the company has
completed detailed geological mapping, rock-chip sampling and an
Induced Polarization (IP) survey at the Tiger Hills epithermal gold
and silver project in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, China.
A 2,500-metre diamond drilling program is scheduled to commence by
mid-May. The Tiger Hills Project is in the Hulunbeier District in
northern Inner Mongolia, approximately 150 kilometres south of the
city of Hailar. The area is easily accessed by vehicle and
comprises sparsely populated low-relief undulating steppe terrain.
Gold and silver mineralization was discovered by Ivanhoe geologists
as part of an extensive prospecting campaign for epithermal
deposits within the northeast-trending extensional Mesozoic
volcanic belt which hosts the 8-million-ounce Baley gold deposit in
southern Siberia. The region had previously been explored by the
Chinese Geology Brigade 115. A soil survey showed the area to be
anomalous in arsenic, antimony and mercury. There is no record of
any previous gold mining in the district. Low-sulphidation
epithermal gold mineralization occurs in hydrothermal eruption
breccias which are exposed along silicified ridges which extend for
two kilometres in a northwest direction. Mineralized host rocks are
silicified rhyodacitic to andesitic lavas, tuffs and minor
volcaniclastic debris flows which are associated with acid volcanic
domes. The breccias are multi-clastic and have a cryptocrystalline
to opaline silica matrix. Colloform banding, carbonate replacement
textures and delicate crustiform layers of moss adularia are
commonly observed. Rock-chip samples from the breccias returned
assays up to 5.89 g/t gold and 11.4 g/t silver. A
recently-completed geophysical survey shows that the mineralization
is directly associated with a four-kilometre northwest-trending
resistivity high. "The very high level silica and breccia textures
observed at Tiger Hills clearly demonstrate that the uppermost zone
of a sizeable epithermal system has been recently exposed. The
highly anomalous gold and silver values present in these types of
rocks are highly encouraging," said Mr. Kirwin. "The mineralized
breccias are similar to those mined at Borealis in Nevada and
Wirralee in Queensland." Ivanhoe's initial drilling program will
focus around three prominent silicified zones with hydrothermal
eruption breccias outcropping over a distance of two kilometres.
Tiger Hills is within two exploration licenses owned by Yahao, an
80/20 joint venture between Ivanhoe Mines (80%) and the Inner
Mongolian Bureau of Geology (20%), which have a total area of 88
square kilometres. Yahao has a 30-year permanent business license
and is the first fully-approved Sino-Foreign joint venture in
China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region to receive both Beijing's
Ministry of Land and Resources (MOLAR) authorization to transfer in
exploration licenses and the Provincial Government's grant of a
30-year business license for those mineral projects developed from
exploration and mining licenses held by the Yahao joint venture in
China. Ivanhoe also is commencing an exploration drilling program
in mid-May at its Bronze Fox gold and copper project in southern
Mongolia. Douglas Kirwin, a qualified person as defined by NI
43-101, supervised the preparation of the information in this
release. The rock-chip samples were assayed by McPhar Geoservices
at its facility in Manila, Philippines. Ivanhoe shares are listed
on the New York and Toronto stock exchanges under the symbol IVN.
Information contacts in North America:
-------------------------------------- Investors: Bill Trenaman:
+1.604.688.5755 Media: Bob Williamson: +1.604.688.5755
Forward-Looking Statements: Statements in this release that are
forward- looking statements are subject to various risks and
uncertainties concerning the specific factors disclosed under the
heading "Risk Factors" and elsewhere in the corporation's periodic
filings with Canadian and US securities regulators. When used in
this document, the words such as "could," "plan," "estimate,"
"expect," "intend," "may," "potential," "should," and similar
expressions are forward-looking statements. The risk factors that
could cause actual results to differ from these forward-looking
statements include, but are not restricted to, the planned
exploration program at the Tiger Hills Project, operational risk,
environmental risk, financial risk, geo-political risk, commodity
risk, currency risk and other statements that are not historical
facts as disclosed under the heading "Risk Factors" and elsewhere
in the corporation's periodic filings with securities regulators in
Canada and the United States. DATASOURCE: Ivanhoe Mines Ltd.
CONTACT: in North America: Investors: Bill Trenaman, (604)
688-5755; Media: Bob Williamson, (604) 688-5755; To request a free
copy of this organization's annual report, please go to
http://www.newswire.ca/ and click on reports@cnw.
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