- Second diamond rig to be deployed at Avoca during the first
week of March.
- Additional rig accelerates current work program at Avoca,
further targets near-surface strike and depth projections of known
mineralization.
VANCOUVER, BC, Feb. 24, 2021 /CNW/ - Leviathan Gold Ltd.
("Leviathan", the "Company") (TSXV: LVX) is pleased
to announce that further to its press release of February 18, 2021 in respect to the initiation of
drilling at the Avoca and Timor projects (the "Projects") in
the Victorian goldfields, Australia, that drilling with a second diamond
rig is to commence at Avoca during the first week of March. This
additional rig is to be deployed in acceleration of the current
work program at Avoca, targeting near-surface strike and depth
projections of known mineralization. Of the recently announced
drilling program at Avoca, two holes - for a total depth of
271m - have been completed at the
Excelsior Reef, and a third is currently targeting a depth of
200m. This drilling forms part of the
greater 30,000m program that
Leviathan is implementing in regard to the Avoca and Timor
projects.
![Leviathan Gold Logo (CNW Group/Leviathan Gold Ltd) Leviathan Gold Logo (CNW Group/Leviathan Gold Ltd)](https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1443581/Leviathan_Gold_Ltd_Leviathan_Gold_to_commence_drilling_with_a_se.jpg)
Leviathan Gold Chief Executive Officer, Luke Norman, remarked: "We are excited to
double our drilling capacity at Avoca, thereby accelerating the
pace of our drill-led exploration programs, and demonstrating the
pace at which we intend to operate. We are moreover pleased to have
been able to achieve mobilization of an additional drill-rig within
two weeks of trading, a mark of the ease of operation in
Victoria, and a critical
achievement in light of the number of targets we have before us to
explore. The deployment of a second drilling rig is an important
step forward in the fulfillment of Leviathan's current
thirty-thousand meter drilling program".
About the Avoca and Timor Projects
Background and History
The Victorian goldfields are one of the world's major gold
provinces, with recorded historic production in excess of 2,500
tonnes - or over 80 million ounces – of gold since their discovery
in 18511. The Avoca and Timor projects comprise 223
square kilometers of exploration tenements within these goldfields,
approximately 180 kilometers north west of the state capital of
Melbourne. The Projects are
well-served by modern infrastructure, are easily accessible via
paved roads, and fall less than 100 kilometers from the regional
cities of Bendigo and Ballarat, both long-established centers of
mining services and expertise.
The Projects are located within an area of the Victorian
goldfields, the golden triangle, that is home to large scale gold
deposits with long and very prominent histories of production such
as those at Ballarat, Bendigo and Castlemaine. More recently, major
discoveries have also been made at the Fosterville Gold Mine near
Bendigo (operated by Kirkland Lake
Gold), which boasts reserves of 1.70 million ounces at an
average grade of 23.1 g/t Au, including 1.16 million ounces at an
average grade of 61.2 g/t Au2. Within the area being
explored by Leviathan Gold hundreds of small historical gold mines
are known to have existed within a 50 km radius of Avoca and
Timor.
The Avoca and Timor projects were the subject of historical
mining between the 1850's and the early 1900's, during which era
operations targeted so-called alluvial "deep lead" gold occurrences
– buried auriferous river-bed deposits - as well as primary
vein-hosted mineralization developed via shaft and underground
stoping methods Such operations reportedly producing 1.3 million
ounces of gold in the Avoca and Timor project areas alone. The
mining, water removal and ore processing methods of the day were
rudimentary, such that only isolated extraction of shallow,
near-surface, visible, high-grade mineralization was possible,
resulting in only very selective and discontinuous mining. Over
fifty such gold occurrences are known within the Projects, and
despite this prodigious endowment, no systematic exploration of the
Projects has occurred. With only limited exploration work having
been recorded since WW1, numerous targets to test, and
mineralization potentially open to depth at most of these, a rare
opportunity exists for Leviathan to pursue a consolidated approach
in the exploration of near-surface mineralization using modern
drilling, geochemical and geophysical techniques.
Historical records are not historical resource estimates, but
instead are official Government records of gold production from
individual mines. Historical production records do not carry a
comparable confidence level to a current Mineral Resource estimate
reported in accordance with CIM standards for resource estimation
and should not be treated as such. Leviathan does not treat
historical production records as indicators of a current mineral
resource or mineral reserve. The information relating to historical
gold mines has not been independently verified by the Qualified
Person and such information is not necessarily indicative of
mineralisation on the properties that it the subject of this Press
Release.
Geology
The Victorian goldfields are located within the Lachlan Fold
Belt, a tectonic belt composed of volcanic, sedimentary rocks, and
granitic intrusions extending in one form or another along the
eastern seaboard of the Australian continent. The Stawell and
Ballarat-Bendigo Zones (of Cambrian and Ordovician age,
respectively) of the Lachlan Fold Belt in the area of Avoca
and Timor typically consist of slates and indurated sandstones that
have experienced regional upper greenschist facies
metamorphism3. Under such conditions the slates are seen
to behave in a more ductile manner than the sandstones, which
typically causes quartz veins to occur as lodes within the slates
and slate-like rocks, and as quartz stockworks or ladder veins
within fracture networks in the sandstones. Numerous faults, and
fault splays located in the Avoca and Timor area – stretching for
tens of kilometers, are associated with gold mineralization, where
they appear to have served as important conduits to the passage of
mineralizing fluids. Silicate alteration occurs proximal to the
quartz veins, in a general assemblage of
biotite-muscovite-chlorite-calcite. Sulphide veins are commonly of
pyrite-pyrrhotite-arsenopyritic character; contemporaneous base
metal sulphide mineralization – including chalcopyrite, galena and
sphalerite - may occur in association with quartz veins.
When taken together, this interplay of lithology, structure,
ductility contrasts, alteration, and ore mineralogy serve as a key
exploration targeting tools at Avoca and Timor. The understanding
of these elements as fundamental building blocks in the definition
of gold mineralization at the Projects is central to Leviathan's
exploration strategy.
In a key illustration of the importance of structure, the
fault-associated Leviathan structural corridor at Timor – from
which the Company takes its name – hosts numerous historic workings
developed on a series of parallel quartz veins, these being where
the majority of historic workings in this particular part of the
Timor area are located. Significant potential is thought to exist
associated with the various other veins and faults within this
corridor to its north and in potential repetitions to its east.
__________________________________
|
1 Earth
Resources Victoria (2020).
https://earthresources.vic.gov.au/geology-exploration/minerals/metals/gold/gold-mining-in-victoria
|
2 Kirkland
Lake Gold (2020).
https://www.kl.gold/our-business/resources-and-reserves/default.aspx
|
Future Work Programs
There are over thirty historical gold workings within the Avoca
project area4, all of which require additional mapping,
surface sampling and drill testing to assess their potential and on
which the Company intends to report on an ongoing basis. The
highest priority targets include:
- Pyrenees Reefs: 16,199 tons mined for 16,602 ounces of gold to
a depth of 130 meters at an average recovered grade of 32 g/t Au,
worked from 1860 to 1912; mineralized shoots per historic
underground mine plans.
- Excelsior Reef: 13,200 tons mined for 9,260 ounces of gold to a
depth of 100 meters at an average recovered grade of 22 g/t Au,
worked from 1909 to 1915; mineralized shoots per historic
underground mine plans.
- Vale's Reefs: 1,444 tons mined for 1,388 ounces of gold to a
depth of 52 meters at an average recovered grade of 29.4 g/t Au,
worked from 1865 to 1883.
- Monte Christo Reefs: 2,795 tons mined for 937 ounces of gold to
a depth of 30 meters at an average recovered grade of 10.3 g/t Au,
worked from 1872 to 1877.
The Timor project lies immediately east of the Avoca project and
hosts numerous hardrock and alluvial gold deposits as evidenced by
the extent of historic workings, of which approximately twenty
hardrock workings can be considered to have been significant
producers. The highest priority targets include:
- Leviathan Group of Mines: 189,085 tons mined for 56,474 ounces
of gold at an average recovered grade of 9.14 g/t Au. The Leviathan
structural corridor hosts several parallel quartz veins with most
of the production coming from one mine active in the early 1900s.
Significant potential is believed to lie within the various other
veins and faults within the corridor to the north.
- Shaw's Reef: 16,881 tons mined for 12,623 ounces of gold to a
depth 130 meters at an average recovered grade of 22.9 g/t Au,
worked from 1883 to 1891. Along strike of this fault zone,
arsenopyrite and stibnite mineralization is recorded in association
with the gold mineralization indicating possible epizonal
Fosterville-style gold mineralization.
The Leviathan Group of Mines and Shaw's Reef both lie on
separate large regional north-south structures traceable for tens
of kilometers with hardrock workings over much of their length.
Neither of these structures have witnessed significant drilling
within the tenement. These two mineralized structures will be a
near-term focus for exploration within the Projects. Modern core
orientation techniques, with the objective of further understanding
the structural controls on mineralization, will be systematically
applied during this program.
___________________________________
|
3 Peters, P. (2016). ECR
Minerals Plc., "Competent Person's Report. Project Number
AU9666" Retrieved from Snowden Mining Industry Consultants Pty
Ltd. https://snowdengroup.com/
|
4 State of Victoria Mining Surveyors
and Registrar's Quarterly Reports from 1860 to 1891 and Annual
Reports issued thereafter. All the production from these reefs
occurred within the Avoca licence.
|
Qualified Person
The technical content of this news release has been reviewed,
verified and approved by Keith
Whitehouse, AusIMM (CP), Exploration Manager of Leviathan
Gold (Australia) Pty. Ltd., a
qualified person as defined by NI 43-101.
On behalf of the Company,
Luke Norman, Chief Executive
Officer and Director
Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services
Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX
Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or
accuracy of this release. No securities regulatory authority has
either approval or disapproved of the contents of this press
release.
This news release does not constitute an offer to sell or a
solicitation of an offer to buy any of the securities in
the United States. The securities
have not been and will not be registered under the United States
Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "U.S. Securities
Act") or any state securities laws and may not be offered or
sold within the United States
unless registered under the U.S. Securities Act and applicable
state securities laws or an exemption from such registration is
available.
Forward-Looking Statements
Information set forth in this news release contains
forward-looking statements that are based on assumptions as of the
date of this news release, including with respect to geological
prospects of Leviathan'smineral projects, planned exploration
activities, success of exploration activities, the relevance of
historical information, the timing of exploration activities,
general business and economic conditions; that applicable approvals
are obtained; that qualified workers, financing, permits,
approvals, and equipment are obtained in a timely manner; that
market conditions continue; that contractual counterparties perform
their obligations as required; and that Leviathan is able to locate
sufficient financing for favourable ongoing operations. These
statements reflect management's current estimates, beliefs,
intentions and expectations. They are not guarantees of future
performance. Leviathan cautions that all forward looking statements
are inherently uncertain and that actual performance may be
affected by many material factors, many of which are beyond
Leviathan's control. Such factors include, among other things:
risks and uncertainties relating to whether exploration activities
will result in commercially viable quantities of mineralized
materials; the possibility of changes to project parameters as
plans continue to be refined; the ability to execute planned
exploration and future drilling programs;COVID-19; the ability to
obtain qualified workers, financing, permits, approvals, and
equipment in a timely manner or at all and on reasonable terms;
changes in the commodity and securities markets; non-performance by
contractual counterparties; and general business and economic
conditions. Accordingly, actual and future events, conditions and
results may differ materially from the estimates, beliefs,
intentions and expectations expressed or implied in the
forward-looking information. Although Leviathan has attempted to
identify important risks and factors that could cause actual
actions, events or results to differ materially from those
described in forward-looking statements, there may be other factors
and risks that cause actions, events or results not to be as
anticipated, estimated or intended. Consequently, undue reliance
should not be placed on such forward-looking statements. In
addition, all forward-looking statements in this press release are
given as of the date hereof. Leviathan disclaims any intention or
obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements,
whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise,
save and except as may be required by applicable securities laws.
The forward-looking statements contained herein are expressly
qualified by this disclaimer.
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SOURCE Leviathan Gold Ltd