Condor Gold plc reported gold grades exceeding expectations from further diamond drilling between and along strike of the planned starter pits at La India project in Nicaragua.
The company said it was encouraged by higher than expected grades in three of the 12 drill holes.
In particular, two high-grade, wide intercepts lie between the two starter pits in an area previously interpreted as having lower grade gold mineralisation.
The two starter pits could now be amalgamated to form one large starter pit, as a broad zone of high grade gold mineralisation was previously interpreted as a low grade zone with the main La India open pit.
Condor will produce an updated mineral resource and mineral reserve estimation and revised feasibility mine plan using the new results along with the recent 25m-spaced infill drilling.
RESULTS
Drill assay results show:
– 60.60 m (54.5 m true width) at 1.98 g/t gold from 4.15m drill depth, including 5.75 m (5.2m true width) at 16.88 g/t gold from 42.55 m drill depth in drill hole LIDC452 located between the two proposed starter pits.
Condor said that the wide zone of gold mineralisation near surface could potentially reduce the strip ratio in the area due to the increase in gold mineralised tonnage verse waste rock, and improve the project economics.
– 3.75 m (3.4 m true width) at 9.94 g/t gold from the hanging wall of the historic mine workings in drill hole LIDC454 located between the two starter pits.
– 9m (8.5m true width) amalgamated width at 4.98 g/t gold from 55.05 m drill depth in the hanging wall and footwall of the historic mine workings, including 5.35 m (5m true width) at 6.61 g/t in the hangingwall of drill hole LIDC456. This drill intercept is located to the south and below the southern starter pit.
The starter pits lie within the main La India open pit which has a mineral reserve estimate of 6.9Mt at 3.1 g/t gold for 675,000 oz gold.