THUNDER BAY – Mining News – Entourage Metals Ltd. (TSX VENTURE:EMT) is reporting “Encouraging soil sampling assays from the 100% owned Northern Arm Properties within the Hemlo Greenstone Belt have been received. These properties straddle a 40 km trend comprising a land package of 155 km2, which covers 90% of the trend. This area has received minimal exploration compared with the main mineralized trend that hosts Hemlo Mines; despite having very similar geology”.
In a press release from the company, it says, “A total of 1,980 soil samples were recently collected from the Northern Arm Trend covering the northwestern portion of Entourage’s Property. The majority of the area is covered by glacial till. The mean value of gold samples over this portion of the property was less than the detection limit (1 ppb) with the 95 percentile at 7 ppb Au. However, 14 samples exceeded the interpreted threshold limit, ranging from 47 ppb to 1,800 ppb Au, with a median value of 341 ppb Au. Of significance was the spatial association of these anomalous samples forming distinct clusters and trend lines; suggesting underlying bedrock and structural control. The highest gold value is associated with a four kilometer trend of anomalous gold in soil, parallel with the geological contact between intrusive and volcanic rocks. These litho geochemical contacts are commonly sites for gold mineralization within Archean rocks”.
“Entourage’s technical team is highly encouraged by these gold in soil results from the Northern Arm Trend,” said John Florek, VP Exploration. “The Company is planning a 2013 program of geologic mapping, additional rock and soil sampling, mechanical trenching and drilling within this prospective belt of rocks north of the Hemlo Mine.”
Historical geochemical sampling within Entourage’s claim group has been limited and erratic on this lesser known Northern Arm Trend. Prior to consolidation of the Northern Arm by Entourage, the area was staked by multiple entities in numerous small individual claim groups. Several occurrences of anomalous base and precious metals have been historically identified on Entourage’s property with multiple deposit styles (Ontario Geological Survey, Map 2614):
- Volcanics: Caravelle No. 4: 7.70% Cu, 0.24% Pb, 4.28 % Zn, 8.23 g/t Au, 116 g/t Ag
(Drill hole grab)
Kusin Showing: 10.7% Zn, 8.9% Pb and 85.7 g/t Ag (trench grab).
Carroll Occurrence: 6.85 g/t Au, 0.54% Zn, and 70 g/t Ag (trench grab)
- Iron Formations: Season Lake Occurrence: 1.03 g/t Au (stripped outcrop grab)
Qued Occurrences: up to 8.85 g/t Au (OGS grab)
- Porphyries: Hemlo Gold Occurrence: 37.35 g/t Au over 1.0 meter (drill hole).
In Archean greenstone belts throughout the world, there is a well documented spatial and genetic link between gold deposits and porphyry intrusions. Of significance are porphyritic intrusions associated with these gold-bearing rocks along this Northern Arm Trend. These rocks exhibit similarities to the Moose Lake Porphyry, which are the footwall rocks to gold mineralization at the Hemlo Deposit. Several historical diamond drill holes targeting gold bearing structures from these porphyries contained significant gold values. One drill hole hosts individual assays from 1.0 g/t to 28.0 g/t Au, averaging 3.9 g/t Au over three meters. A second historic hole assayed 37.35 g/t Au over 1.0 m hosted in Hemlo “look-alike” porphyry with favorable alteration (Ontario Geological Survey, Map 2614). It is cautioned that these results are historic in nature, have not been verified by Entourage technical personnel, and should not be relied upon. Limited drilling and trenching has taken place targeting these occurrences.
Hemlo was discovered in 1981, and has to date produced over 20 million ounces of gold. There has been very limited exploration activity in the region after the initial exploration boom which came to a halt in the mid 1990’s. Since Hemlo’s discovery, no additional gold deposits have been found and for a greenstone belt with a large deposit (>25 Moz), this is a statistical anomaly. Entourage considers that there is an excellent opportunity to find additional gold deposits in this region that are satellites to Hemlo.
The Northern Arm Property is accessible from Route 614, which connects to the Trans-Canada Highway. This route bisects the property and is linked to logging roads which provides easy cost-effective access to the property. The Property is located in Northern Ontario, 250 km east-northeast of the City of Thunder Bay, and 35 km northeast of the town of Marathon.