Aton Resources Inc. (AAN: TSX-V) (“Aton” or the “Company") is
pleased to update investors on the latest assay results from the
Phase 2 diamond drilling programme at its advanced Rodruin gold
exploration project. Rodruin is located in the Company’s 100% owned
Abu Marawat Concession (“Abu Marawat” or the “Concession”), in the
Eastern Desert of Egypt.
Highlights:
- Diamond
drilling is ongoing at Rodruin, with 38 drill holes now having been
completed to date, ROD-048 and ROD-051 to ROD-087, for a total of
4,125 metres;
- Drill
holes ROD-072 and ROD-073 were drilled to test the “Death Slots”
ancient workings on the North Ridge. Surface sampling of the
workings had previously returned up to 321 g/t Au;
- Drill
hole ROD-073 returned a mineralised intersection grading
8.74 g/t Au, 29.4 g/t Ag, 0.87% Cu, 1.04% Pb and 2.35% Zn over
12.0m, from 53.0m down hole depth;
- The
drilling indicated the host rocks to be very heavily hydrothermally
altered.
“These latest results from the previously
undrilled Death Slots area again show the fantastic potential of
the entire Rodruin deposit area, and we are sure there is a lot
more to come” said Tonno Vahk, Interim CEO. “These new holes are
testing ancient workings on the North Ridge which returned a number
of high grade assays from surface sampling, and due to the
inaccessibility of the site, it has taken a while for us to be able
to get up there and to drill them. But we have now done it and we
are again very happy with the results. The extended diamond
drilling programme is continuing apace, and we still very much like
what we are seeing. We are also about to kick off the planned
infill RC drilling programme at Hamama West very shortly, as we
push this project forwards. Hamama West will be only the second
modern gold mine developed in Egypt, and will be the first phase of
the development of the overall Abu Marawat Concession area.”
Rodruin diamond drilling
programme
The Rodruin prospect was discovered in December
2017 by Aton geologists (see news release dated December 14, 2017),
and is located approximately 18km east of the Company’s Hamama West
mineral deposit (Figure 1). During 2018 Aton constructed a c. 4.5km
access road to the prospect, and undertook a highly successful 50
hole Phase 1 reverse circulation percussion (“RC”) drilling
programme at Rodruin, which returned numerous mineralised
intersections including 36m grading 12.47 g/t Au and 9.3 g/t Ag,
from 5m downhole depth (hole ROP-003, see news release dated
October 1, 2018).
The Phase 2 diamond drilling programme at
Rodruin commenced in late November 2021, and results reported to
date include 88.25m of oxide mineralisation grading 1.74 g/t Au and
9.7 g/t Ag, from 25.75m (hole ROD-055, see news release dated March
1, 2022), and 129.5m of oxide grading 1.00 g/t Au and 8.8 g/t Ag,
over its entire length of hole ROD-056 from its collar (see news
release dated March 7, 2022). Aton has now started drilling the
deeper sulphide mineralisation and has recently reported an 88.6m
interval grading 5.76 g/t Au, 42.0 g/t Ag, 0.31% Cu and 2.40% Zn
from 117.2m depth, including a 9.9m very high grade interval from
138.1m, grading 39.4 g/t Au, 261.7 g/t Ag, 0.84% Cu and 3.55% Zn
(see news release dated May 10, 2022).
Discussion of results
Surface sampling of the ancient “Death Slots”
underground workings (Figure 2) in 2017-18 returned several high
grade assays, including 321 g/t, 18.6 g/t, 12.75 g/t and 10.1 g/t
Au, as well as 2.98 g/t Au from the nearby collapsed Summit Veins
workings (see news releases dated February 6, 2018, March 5, 2018
and April 16, 2018). These ancient workings are located in an area
of very steep terrain on the North Ridge. Mapping of the area
indicates outcropping carbonate altered and argillic altered
tuffaceous sediments and slates (Figure 2), with large amounts of
superficial scree and talus cover on the steep slopes.
Mineralisation in the Death Slots workings appears to be associated
with a zone of saccharoidal quartz-carbonate-sulphide veining,
associated with jarositic oxidation minerals, as well as copper and
zinc oxide minerals. On the north side of the ridge line float
material consisting of gossanous blocks of similar quartz vein
material is widespread within the thin scree/talus cover, although
it is not clear if this material is close to being in situ or has
been transported far down the mountainside. It is very conceivable
that further outcrops of similar veining are obscured by scree.
Aton spent several months developing a drill
road on to the North Ridge to provide drill access to the area.
Furthermore a second road has been pushed along the southern flank
of the North Ridge and a pad has been constructed to provide a site
from which the Summit Veins and the Death Slots can also be drilled
horizontally from below (Figure 2) Aton has completed 2 holes as
part of the current diamond drilling programme to test under the
Death Slots workings (Figures 2 and 3). Details of the collars of
holes ROD-072 and ROD-073 are provided in Table 1.
Hole ID |
Collar co-ordinates 1 |
Dip 2 |
Gridazimuth 2 |
EOHdepth (m) |
Comments |
X |
Y |
Z |
ROD-072 |
553045 |
2912980 |
756 |
-68.0 |
354.9 |
198.50 |
North Ridge – Death Slots |
ROD-073 |
553045 |
2912980 |
756 |
-50.1 |
345.6 |
111.10 |
North Ridge – Death Slots |
Notes: 1) Collar
co-ordinates as laid out using handheld
GPS 2) Collar
surveys of drill holes undertaken at c. 5-6m depth, using Reflex
EZ-Trac survey
tool 3) All
co-ordinates are UTM (WGS84) Zone 36R |
Table 1: Collar details of diamond
drill holes ROD-072 and ROD-073
Both holes intersected deeply weathered and
strongly carbonate and phyllic altered sediments with ROD-073
returning a mineralised intersection of 8.74 g/t Au, 29.4
g/t Ag, 0.87% Cu, 1.04% Pb and 2.35% Zn over 12.0m
(estimated true width of 6m), from 53.0m down hole depth, which was
clearly a down-dip extension of the mineralisation exploited in the
ancient near-surface Death Slots workings (Table 2). This interval
included a 3.2m high grade zone grading 25.23 g/t Au and
66.7 g/t Ag. ROD-072 also intersected narrow zones of gold
and zinc mineralisation, and ended in strongly
quartz-sericite-pyrite altered and weakly weathered sediments.
Hole ID |
Intersection (m) 1 |
Au(g/t) |
Ag(g/t) |
Cu(%) |
Pb(%) |
Zn(%) |
Comments |
From |
To |
Interval |
ROD-072 |
114.80 |
116.80 |
2.00 |
4.71 |
62.9 |
0.07 |
0.00 |
0.03 |
|
137.00 |
141.00 |
4.00 |
0.61 |
8.4 |
0.64 |
0.03 |
8.23 |
152.00 |
155.00 |
3.00 |
0.96 |
8.2 |
0.56 |
0.00 |
0.83 |
ROD-073 |
53.00 |
65.00 |
12.00 |
8.74 |
29.4 |
0.87 |
1.04 |
2.35 |
Down-dip extension of ancient workings |
incl. |
59.80 |
63.00 |
3.20 |
25.23 |
66.7 |
1.56 |
3.20 |
1.65 |
Notes: 1) Intersections
calculated at a nominal cutoff grade of 0.3 g/t Au in runs of
continuous mineralisation |
Table 2: Mineralised intersections
from diamond drill holes ROD-072 and ROD-073
The Company is encouraged by the results from
these latest holes on the North Ridge as they confirm the high
grade mineralisation sampled at surface in the Death Slots workings
continues at depth. The Company is particularly encouraged by the
identification of high grade gold-polymetallic (Au-Ag-Cu-Pb-Zn)
mineralisation in wide zones of strongly quartz-sericite-pyrite
altered sediments, that bears similarities to the high grade
mineralisation recently intersected in hole ROD-071 (see news
release dated May 10, 2021), and at the Aladdin’s Hill zone. The
presence of additional zones of mineralisation is suggested by the
significant amounts of mineralised float in scree, and Aton
believes that there is strong potential for the identification of
further mineralisation within and associated with the heavily
hydrothermally altered rocks that are poorly exposed on the largely
inaccessible North Ridge.
Sample processing and analytical
procedures
Drill core was logged by Aton geologists, and
marked up for cutting and sampling at the Rodruin core farm.
Samples were typically selected over nominal 1m intervals, but as
determined by the logged lithologies. The core was half-cut by Aton
staff at the onsite Rodruin sample preparation facility.
The split half-core samples were collected and
bagged up in cloth bags, weighed and crushed to -4mm onsite, and
split to a nominal c. 250-500g sample size. The coarse crushed
reject samples are retained onsite at the Rodruin sample prep
facility.
QAQC samples are inserted at a rate of
approximately 1 certified reference material (or “standard” sample)
every 30 samples, 1 blank sample every 15 samples, and 1 duplicate
split sample every 15 samples.
The c. 250-500g dried, crushed and split samples
were shipped to ALS Minerals sample preparation laboratory at Marsa
Alam, Egypt where they were pulverised to a size fraction of better
than 85% passing 75 microns. From this pulverised material a
further sub-sample was split off with a nominal c. 50g size, which
was shipped on to ALS Minerals at Rosia Montana, Romania for
analysis.
Samples were analysed for gold by fire assay
with an atomic absorption spectroscopy (“AAS”) finish (analytical
code Au-AA23), and for silver, copper, lead and zinc using an aqua
regia digest followed by an AAS finish (analytical code AA45). Any
high grade gold samples (>10 g/t Au) were re-analysed using
analytical code Au-GRA21 (also fire assay, but with a gravimetric
finish). Any high grade Ag and base metal samples (Ag >100 g/t,
and Cu, Pb and Zn >10,000ppm or >1%) were re-analysed using
the ore grade technique AA46 (also an aqua regia digest followed by
an AAS finish).
About Aton Resources Inc. Aton
Resources Inc. (AAN: TSX-V) is focused on its 100% owned Abu
Marawat Concession (“Abu Marawat”), located in Egypt’s
Arabian-Nubian Shield, approximately 200 km north of Centamin’s
world-class Sukari gold mine. Aton has identified numerous gold and
base metal exploration targets at Abu Marawat, including the Hamama
deposit in the west, the Abu Marawat deposit in the northeast, and
the advanced Rodruin exploration prospect in the south of the
Concession. Two historic British gold mines are also located on the
Concession at Sir Bakis and Semna. Aton has identified several
distinct geological trends within Abu Marawat, which display
potential for the development of a variety of styles of precious
and base metal mineralisation. Abu Marawat is 447.7 km2 in size and
is located in an area of excellent infrastructure; a four-lane
highway, a 220kV power line, and a water pipeline are in close
proximity, as are the international airports at Hurghada and
Luxor.
Qualified person The technical
information contained in this News Release was prepared by Javier
Orduña BSc (hons), MSc, MCSM, DIC, MAIG, SEG(M), Exploration
Manager of Aton Resources Inc. Mr. Orduña is a qualified person
(QP) under National Instrument 43-101 Standards of Disclosure for
Mineral Projects.For further information regarding Aton Resources
Inc., please visit us at www.atonresources.com or contact:TONNO
VAHKInterim CEOTel: +1 604 318 0390 Email:
info@atonresources.com
Note Regarding Forward-Looking
Statements Some of the statements contained in this
release are forward-looking statements. Since forward-looking
statements address future events and conditions; by their very
nature they involve inherent risks and uncertainties. Actual
results in each case could differ materially from those currently
anticipated in such statements. Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor
its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in
policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for
the adequacy or accuracy of this release.
Figures accompanying this announcement are available
at:https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/ebe313c2-abf8-41b2-a4fb-d18d1e8b6afa
https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/bd369de9-3224-4ea2-8735-5e3cec6e1e69
https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/83223083-25af-4cb8-b614-d995ddd15535
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