Falcon reports visible gold at Central Canada Gold & Polymetallic Project

2020.12.03

Just over a month into a Stage Two drill program, Falcon Gold (TSXV:FG) is making good progress at its flagship Central Canada Gold & Polymetallic Project, located 21 km east of Atitokan, and 160 km west of Thunder Bay, Ontario.

Each of five holes that were targeting the main structural trend of the past-producing Central Canada gold mine, intersected mineralization, with pierce points spaced over a 125-km strike length at various depths.  A total of 1,137 meters of drill core and 240 samples have been submitted for gold analysis. The program, which started with drill crews mobilizing on Nov. 9, is about 60% complete.

The highlight from the Dec. 2 news release was hole CC 20-12, drilled just west of the old mine shaft. Samples taken from the shaft in 2002 returned grades up to 13.74 grams per tonne gold from the quartz vein, while a sample of the altered quartz porphyry host rock, showed 4.06 g/t Au.

According to the company, a rose-colored quartz vein marks the start of the main mine zone at the contact with a felsic porphyry at approximately 89m depth. The porphyry is strongly altered to 97.4m with tourmaline-pyrite quartz veining containing approximately 2% pyrite and 0.25% arsenopyrite and local fine-grained chalcopyrite and telluride minerals. This is followed by 20 cm of tourmaline-quartz-pyritic (pyrite content of approximately 7%) altered volcanic and a very distinctive quartz vein from 97.6 m to 97.9 m that is banded or laminated with tourmaline, quartz and about 1% very fine arsenopyrite and pyrite, and 0.2% fine chalcopyrite and telluride that appears to have a true with of about 20 cm. The most notable component of this vein is visible gold, which occurs the size of several pin heads, and smaller grains.

“Finding visible gold (VG) in our hole 20-12 is very encouraging and it further validates our geological model,” says Karim Rayani, Falcon Gold’s CEO. “Seeing VG in the mineralized sections tells us we are on the right track! Our geologists are currently cutting samples and will be continuing to submit them for analyses and report them as they become available.”

Central Canada property

Covering an historic producer with a shaft and mill, the 10,392-hectare Central Canada gold & polymetallic property features a reported intersection of 0.64% copper, 0.15% cobalt, 1.1% zinc and 0.35 g/t gold over a true width of 40 meters.

The northern claims are underlain by Archean age greenstone rocks that include mafic volcanic flows, gabbroic intrusions and quartz feldspar porphyries in which the gold mineralization is hosted. Notably, as seen in the map above, the northern claims (grey dots) are contiguous with Agnico Eagle’s (TSX:AEM) Hammond Reef gold deposit, which hosts a Measured and Indicated (M&I) resource of 4.5 million ounces.

The southern part of the Central Canada project is covered by Sapawe Lake and is underlain by iron formation and greenstone rock units that host Falcon’s targeted gold and cobalt occurrences.

The Central Canada gold mine has an interesting history. Between 1901 and 1907, a shaft was sunk to a depth of 12 meters and 27 ounces of gold from 18 tons were mined using a stamp mill. During the 1930s, the shaft was deepened to 40m with about 42m of crosscuts, and a 75 ton-per-day gold mill was installed. Diamond drilling by Anjamin Mines in 1965 returned a 0.6-meter intersection of 37 g/t Au. Another hole assayed 44 g/t Au over 2.1m.

A more aggressive drill program in 1985 saw Interquest Resources punch in 13 holes @ 1,840m, the highlight being a 1.1-meter intercept of 30 g/t Au.

In 2012, diamond drilling was completed by TerraX Minerals, consisting of three holes totaling 363m, spaced 55 meters apart to test a 110m strike length of the main Central Canada structure. The first TerraX hole, CC12-01, cut 10.61m averaging 1.32 g/t Au, including 1.82m of 4.77 g/t Au. 

Fast forward to 2020. A 7-hole, 1,055m program, completed by Falcon Gold this past July, featured a 3-meter interval of 10.17 g/t Au, @ 67m down-hole. Falcon also intersected a new mineralized zone, untested by previous operators, at 104m depth, which sampled 18.6 g/t Au over 1m.

Also during July, Falcon Gold reached another milestone in acquiring an additional 7,477 hectares of mineral claims, growing the company’s land position to 10,392 ha in the Atikokan gold camp — bested only by Agnico Eagle Mines and its 32,070-ha Hammond Reef exploration project, bought by AEM in 2018.

Open pit M&I resources at Hammond Reef are estimated at 208 million tonnes grading 0.67 g/t gold (containing 4.5 million ounces of gold), as well as open pit Inferred resources of 0.5Mt grading 0.74 g/t gold (containing 12,000 ounces), using a cut-off grade of 0.32 g/t.

Falcon now controls a combined 51 km of strike length along the Quetico Fault Zone and its major northeast-trending splays such as the Marmion Fault Zone.

The company believes the confluence of the splays running off the Quetico Fault Zone, and the close proximity of the Hammond Reef deposit, make the new northern claims group an excellent gold target.

The acquisitions encompass a number of historical exploration areas, including the Jack Lake gold deposit (44,946 oz @ 15.2 g/t Au), the Snow Lake occurrence (copper, zinc, silver and gold), and the McKinnon Cu-Zn-Au prospect. According to Falcon Gold, despite the Atikokan gold camp having a rich mining history dating back to the 1800s, there is a surprising lack of comprehensive data on which to build an understanding of the gold deposits.

However, Falcon has been actively searching archives and historical journals and is building its own database as it applies to the Atikokan gold camp.  The Company believes that as an early participant in the region and one that holds a major land position, it is poised to build one or more gold asset that could lead to a new mining operation or attract a significant corporate suitor to the benefit of our stakeholders, large and small.

2020 exploration

Towards that goal, FG has been working diligently this year in advancing its knowledge of the Central Canada project, at the drill bit.

The previously mentioned 7-hole program, completed in July, was designed to test the strike extension of the historic Central Canada mine. Each of the holes successfully intersected the historical mine trend with mineralized quartz veins intersected to a depth of 175m. Drilling also defined a well-mineralized quartz porphyry unit, 40-65m deep. The deepest hole discovered a previously unidentified mineralized fault zone with extensive quartz veining from 142 to 177m. Significant chalcopyrite, pyrite and arsenopyrite were noted.

Other takeaways from the 1,055m summer drill program were as follows:

• The gold-mineralized mine zone that hosts the Central Canada gold mineralization is clearly a significant structure of highly schistose and altered rock that appears to cross numerous lithologies commonly containing multiple quartz veins and stringers variably mineralized with gold, sulphide minerals and tourmaline. The gold-mineralized mine zone strikes east-north-east and extends well beyond the area drilled by Falcon. The width of the zone is also quite noteworthy.
• The Company has determined that the continuity and strength of the Central Canada mine gold mineralization are suitable for progression into definition drilling and has laid out plans for its second 2020 drill program. The program is budgeted for 2,000m of core drilling with 9 holes planned. The objective of the drilling is to complement Falcon’s previous seven holes plus the three holes done in 2012 by TerraX Minerals Inc. (“TerraX”) in order to undertake an inaugural mineral resource calculation. The Stage Two drill program work has commenced and drilling can be expected to be completed before the December holidays.

The first two holes of Stage Two were reported complete on Nov. 18. Both were drilled on a section that included two previously drilled holes, CC12-10 and CC20-01.

As Falcon Gold waits for assays, another item on its “to do” list is a geophysical survey.

On Oct. 1, Falcon announced it had contacted Quebec company ProspectAir to complete an airborne geophysics survey of the 10,000-hectare Central Canada Gold & Polymetallic Project. Consisting of high-resolution airborne magnetics and time-domain electromagnetic data collection over 1,510-line kilometers at 100m spacings, the survey will provide high-definition magnetic signatures and electromagnetic conductors which will aid in the delineation of gold bearing lithologies and structures along the prospective trends. The high-resolution data will also assist in determining drill targets at the Central Canada mine in which gold mineralization is open in both east and west directions.

At first delayed by bad weather, the survey was okayed to begin in November.

Conclusion

Falcon Gold (TSXV:FG) has all the elements we like to see in a brownfield-stage gold junior. The company is a large land owner in a past-producing mining district, with a mid-tier gold producer, Agnico-Eagle Mines, exploring just off its northern boundary.

Its flagship Central Canada gold & polymetallic property has seen some very promising intercepts in and around the old mine. Each of seven holes in a first-pass drill program completed in July, successfully intersected the historical mine trend, with mineralized quartz veins intersected to a depth of 175m.

FG is currently completing a non-brokered, institutional $750,000 private placement, which provides the company with enough cash to complete the geophysical survey and the rest of its Stage Two drill program. I’m looking forward to seeing the results of that survey and the assay results, which if they’re anything like historical returns, should be worth waiting for. 

Falcon Gold
TSX.V:FG
Cdn$0.12, 2020.12.02
Shares Outstanding 60,435,184m
Market cap Cdn$7,250,000m
FG website

Richard (Rick) Mills
aheadoftheherd.com
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