Northquest project continues
Junior explorer plans to be back in 2015, encouraged by results of 2014 drilling program
Walter Strong
Northern News Services
Published Monday, January 19, 2015
TIKIRARJUAQQ/WHALE COVE
Northquest Ltd.(TSX.V:NQ) released the final results from its 2014 summer drill program on its 861 square-kilometre Pistol Bay gold project near Whale Cove on the northwestern shores of Hudson Bay.
In 2014, Northquest did more than 4,500 metres of drilling on the property over 18 holes. Most drilling was focused on the Vickers target which presents itself as a one kilometre long geological formation with gold showings in surface outcrops.
Jon North, Northquest CEO and professional geologist, was pleased to report work to date confirms and extends Northquest's confidence that Pistol Bay remains a going concern for the junior explorer.
"We are delighted to report that we have intersected the Vickers gold zone for an additional 200 metres of strike length, and that it has similar width as it does in the west (portion of the zone)," North said.
The best result from this summer was a hole that returned 1.65 grams per tonne (g/t) gold over 221.74 metres.
This wasn't the only hole to return a relatively high grade of gold over more than 100 metres. In separate holes, North found 1.4 g/t gold over 245 metres, 1.65 g/t gold over 221.74 metres, 1.06 g/t over 178 metres, 1.36 g/t over 134.42 metres.
There were two showings of visible gold in core samples from separate holes.
Both were deep underground one at almost 310 metres and the other at little more than 190 metres.
Only one of the 13 holes drilled on Vickers failed to intersect the expected gold zone. The results from the 12 holes that did intersect the zone are understood by Northquest to confirm the gold zone extends from "near surface to 300 metres."
The holes were widely spaced - more than 50 metres apart - and will require infill drilling to tighten the spacing and confirm the continuity of the zone. North said the plan for 2015 is to begin that infill drilling this year, and to begin drilling on the western portion of the zone which remains relatively undrilled.
Other targets on the property were drilled this summer as well, at Sako and Bazooka.
In 2013, the Sako zone saw extensive prospecting over a 21.7 line-kilometre grid at 50 metre spacing over 2.53 square kilometres of surface area.
During that 2013 program, 10 grab samples containing up to 87.2 g/t gold, which is a three ounce gold per tonne sample, were found in the central portion of the zone.
This, combined with the results of drilling in seven holes on the Sako target which showed up to two g/t gold over 6.17 metres, meant North went ahead this summer and drilled three more holes at Sako.
Some gold mineralization was found - up to 1.99 g/t gold over one metre, but results were not encouraging enough for North to plan follow-up drilling on the target in 2015.
The Bazooka target is a six square-kilometre zone that returned an average of 3.84 g/t gold from 12 surface grab samples. Four holes drilled previously returned a mixed result, but one returned 2.38 g/t gold over 9.67 metres.
This summer, Northquest drilled two more holes on the Bazooka target intersecting up to 1.53 g/t gold over 2.56 metres, which was encouraging enough to Northquest to include the Bazooka target in further drilling programs.
The significant thing to take from this summer's work is that Northquest will be back later this year for more drilling.
Over the past four years Northquest has drilled 13,660 metres over 66 holes, with 9,400 metres of that drilling on the Vickers target.
Funding for this summer's drill program came from the $2.5 million Russian gold miner Nord Gold invested in Northquest earlier in 2014. In return, Nord Gold took a 22.3 per cent stake in Northquest.
Early in December, Nord Gold re-uped its commitment to Northquest with a $369,000 investment. A further $831,000 (for a total of $1.2 million) in investor funding was announced at the same time.
No NI 43-101 gold resource has been made on the property yet.
