Antelope plans big program near Le Roi mine property

President, Christian von Hessert, noted that funding for the work will be raised “on a staged basis” and he said a gold reserve of 50-100,000 oz would have to be blocked out to justify an underground program. Such a program would need a larger budget, he added.

The north belt area, where Antelope is now drilling, was mined to approximately 250 ft and records indicate gold production of 1,806 oz from 2,859 tons of ore. This zone appears to be on strike with the Le Roi mine which produced over three million ounces gold and three million ounces silver, the company said. Mineralization currently being explored lies approximately 300 ft above the main portal to the Le Roi where mining ceased in ore some 2,000 ft below surface.

Antelope has been concentrating on the north belt zone where ground water conditions are favorable and mineralized intercepts were closer to the surface. It’s also accessible by adit, while the south belt would need a ramp or shaft requiring pumping.

The north belt, which has been drilled to a depth of 300 ft, has a known strike length of 800 ft and is still open. Some of the better recent intercepts included 12.8 ft of 0.3 oz gold, 15.9 ft averaging 0.3 oz, 16.4 ft of 0.25 oz, and 5.9 ft grading 0.4 oz. Most of the intercepts are fairly shallow.

The company is attracted to the fact that production from the Le Roi mine came from relatively small stoping areas so blocking out new reserves could be very rewarding, albeit time consuming. Gold mineralization is associated with sulphides so magnetic and electro- magnetic geophysical methods are used for locating good targets. There is a good correlation between sulphide content and gold content and the gold seems evenly distributed in the sulphides. Antelope believes a reasonable inventory for the north and south belts is about 50,000 oz gold.

Most of the past production from the area was direct-smelted at Cominco’s nearby Trail smelter, but a good sulphide float could be made. As much as 40% of the gold is native and extractable by gravity concentration.

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