Ariana Resources PLC Ariana Resources Plc : First Drilling Results From Karakavak
February 06 2017 - 2:00AM
UK Regulatory
TIDMAAU
6 February 2017
AIM: AAU
FIRST DRILLING RESULTS FROM KARAKAVAK
Ariana Resources plc ("Ariana" or "the Company"), the gold exploration
and development company operating in Turkey, is pleased to announce
results for its first drilling programme conducted at the Karakavak
prospect, which is part of the Kiziltepe Sector. Kiziltepe is part of
the Red Rabbit Joint Venture with Proccea Construction Co. and will be
50% owned by Ariana once the mine is operational in Q1 2017.
Highlights:
-- Initial drilling at the Karakavak prospect demonstrates potential for a
low strip-ratio open-pittable resource based on only 8% of the vein
system tested to date.
-- A total strike of 180m of outcropping veins were tested with best
intercepts including 4m @ 1.72g/t Au, 3m @ 1.11g/t Au and 3m @ 1.06g/t Au
all from within about 10m from surface.
-- Vein orientation and geochemistry suggests development high in the
epithermal system; potential to identify more steeply-dipping feeder
structures.
-- A further 2,150m of gold-bearing outcropping veins still remain untested
by drilling.
Dr. Kerim Sener, Managing Director, commented:
"These encouraging initial results from the Karakavak prospect confirm
the potential in this area for several shallow open-pittable resources
as satellites to the Kiziltepe Mine operations. The drilling has
demonstrated that the vein systems have unusual orientations, dipping at
approximately 35-45 degrees to the south and that they likely developed
very high in the epithermal system. In particular, this is demonstrated
by the lack of silver and the occurrence in this area of higher
concentrations of metals typically associated with the uppermost parts
of such systems.
Trial mining at this location will proceed on the basis of this new data
and we will aim to permit several other areas across the Karakavak
prospect in order to conduct further work. An open-pittable resource
target has been established in this area to guide our strategy for
further exploration and development. We are confident that, in time,
Karakavak will meaningfully add to the mineable resources within the
Kiziltepe Sector."
Drilling Programme
The Karakavak prospect was drill tested as part of the 2016 Phase Two
drilling programme, which was initiated in late October. The drilling
was carried out by Spektra Jeotek San. ve Tic. A.S. supervised by the
Ariana exploration team and team members from Ariana's Turkish
subsidiary, Galata Madencilik San. ve Tic. Ltd. ("Galata"). One
objective for the Phase Two programme was to drill test two easily
accessible and previously permitted locations on the Karakavak Main and
Karakavak South vein systems. A total of 464m of Reverse Circulation
(RC) drilling was completed within the Karakavak prospect of the
Kiziltepe Sector (Table 1).
The Karakavak prospect is located approximately 10km northeast of the
Kiziltepe mine site, which is accessed by 27km of well-maintained
asphalt and forestry roads (Figure 1). Drilling commenced at Karakavak
Main in late October 2016 and a total of 362m was drilled for 10 RC
holes. All drilling was undertaken at easily accessible locations where
the Company had previously completed trial mining of surface material.
Historic channel samples of exposed vein from the trail mining area of
Karakavak Main returned grades including 1m @ 1.94 g/t Au, 1m @ 1.48 g/t
Au and 1m @ 1.22m g/t Au.
Sectional and scissor orientated drill holes at Karakavak Main revealed
that the vein system dips gently at about 35 degrees to the south, which
is very different to the vein orientations at Kiziltepe, which are near
vertical. This geometry made it difficult for the team to position the
drill rig within current permit areas to target the vein system at
greater depths. The gentle dip to the south of the veins is
sub-parallel to the topography on the southern flank of Ulus Mountain,
which bodes well for a low strip-ratio open pittable resource at this
location. Permitting for future work is now being planned to further
test anomalous strike extensions of the Karakavak Main vein.
The next area tested was Karakavak South, approximately 3km southwest of
Karakavak Main. At this location the team drilled tested a further 100m
of outcropping vein strike for a total of 102m over four holes, testing
a relatively continuous 3m wide massive crystalline and colloform banded
vein at 50 to 25m collar separation. Historic surface rock-chip results
from the Karakavak South vein system include 20.80 g/t Au + 33.5 g/t Ag,
2.45 g/t Au + 22.1 g/t Ag and 2.26 g/t Au + 1.9 g/t Ag.
Drilling results from Karakavak South identified a dip of 45 degrees to
the south on the vein system. Difficulties in positioning the drill rig
to intercept the mineralisation at an appropriate angle resulted in the
programme ending early at Karakavak South. One successful drill hole
(KRK-RC12-16), was able intercept mineralisation and reported 3m @
1.11g/t Au.
The results of the Karakavak drilling has allowed the Ariana team to
better understand the geometry of mineralisation at both Karakavak Main
and Karakavak South. The Company will now assess and permit new
locations to better access the vein system for future drilling
programmes. To date, a total 180m out of 2,330m (<8%), of geochemically
anomalous quartz veins at Karakavak have been drill tested.
Table 1: Significant RC drilling results from the 2016 programme at
Karakavak, arranged in order of the gram x metre intercepts (down-hole
gold equivalent grade multiplied by intercept thickness). The
intercepts reported in this table are the down-hole lengths. Intercept
grades have been calculated using a 0.5 g/t Au minimum cut-off with up
to 2m internal waste allowed.
Hole ID Vein From (m) To (m) Interval (m) Grade Au (g/t)
KRK-RC10-16 Karakavak Main 3 7 4 1.72
KRK-RC09-16 Karakavak Main 3 6 3 1.06
KRK-RC12-16 Karakavak South 9 12 3 1.11
KRK-RC10-16 Karakavak Main 9 13 4 0.72
KRK-RC08-16 Karakavak Main 2 5 3 0.80
KRK-RC04-16 Karakavak Main 4 9 5 0.33
KRK-RC02-16 Karakavak Main 2 4 2 0.62
KRK-RC03-16 Karakavak Main 4 5 1 1.09
KRK-RC07-16 Karakavak Main 1 2 1 0.76
Figure 1 below: shows map of the Kiziltepe Sector of the Red Rabbit JV
showing the position of major gold-silver prospects and proposed
trucking routes from satellite mines to the primary Kiziltepe Mine
operations. The Karakavak area has been drill-tested only partially
between Karakavak Main and South.
Sampling and Assaying Procedures
139 samples were selected based on geological logging of RC chips during
drilling and sent for assay. All samples from the drilling programme
undertaken by Ariana Resources plc, were prepared and assayed by 30g
fire assay, and ICP-MS multi-element analysis, at the ALS Global
laboratory in Izmir. Routine re-assaying of all samples assaying
greater than 10 g/t of gold and 100 g/t of silver has also been
completed by ALS Global. Standard, blank and duplicate samples are
being used in the sample batches, which is in line with the Company's
quality control procedures. Laboratory sample preparation, assaying
procedures and chain of custody are appropriately controlled. The
Company maintains an archive of reference RC chip samples, in addition
to all sample pulps and splits.
Contacts:
Ariana Resources plc Tel: +44 (0) 20 7407 3616
Michael de Villiers, Chairman
Kerim Sener, Managing Director
Beaumont Cornish Limited Tel: +44 (0) 20 7628 3396
Roland Cornish / Felicity Geidt
Beaufort Securities Limited Tel: +44 (0) 20 7382 8300
Jon Belliss
Panmure Gordon (UK) Limited Tel: +44 (0) 20 7886 2500
Adam James / Tom Salvesen
Editor's Notes:
Dr Kerim Sener, BSc (Hons), MSc, PhD, is the Managing Director of Ariana
Resources plc. A graduate of the University of Southampton in Geology,
he also holds a Master's degree from the Royal School of Mines (Imperial
College, London) in Mineral Exploration and a doctorate from the
University of Western Australia. He is a Fellow of The Geological
Society of London and has worked in geological research and mineral
consultancy in Africa, Australia and Europe. He has read and approved
the technical disclosure in this regulatory announcement.
About Ariana Resources:
Ariana is an exploration and development company focused on epithermal
gold-silver and porphyry copper-gold deposits in Turkey. The Company is
developing a portfolio of prospective licences originally selected on
the basis of its in-house geological and remote-sensing database.
The Company's flagship assets are its Kiziltepe and Tavsan gold projects
which form the Red Rabbit Gold Project. Both contain a series of
prospects, within two prolific mineralised districts in the Western
Anatolian Volcanic and Extensional (WAVE) Province in western Turkey.
This Province hosts the largest operating gold mines in Turkey and
remains highly prospective for new porphyry and epithermal deposits.
These core projects, which are separated by a distance of 75km, form
part of a 50:50 Joint Venture with Proccea Construction Co. The
Kiziltepe Sector of the Red Rabbit Project is fully-permitted and is
currently in construction. The total resource inventory at the Red
Rabbit Project and wider project area stands at c. 525,000 ounces of
gold equivalent. At Kiziltepe a Net Smelter Return ("NSR") royalty of
up to 2.5% on future production is payable to Franco-Nevada Corporation.
At Tavsan an NSR royalty of up to 2% on future production is payable to
Sandstorm Gold.
In north-eastern Turkey, Ariana owns 100% of the Salinbas Gold Project,
comprising the Salinbas gold-silver deposit and the Ardala
copper-gold-molybdenum porphyry among other prospects. The total
resource inventory of the Salinbas project area is c. 1 million ounces
of gold equivalent. A NSR royalty of up to 2% on future production is
payable to Eldorado Gold Corporation.
Beaufort Securities Limited and Panmure Gordon (UK) Limited are joint
brokers to the Company and Beaumont Cornish Limited is the Company's
Nominated Adviser.
For further information on Ariana you are invited to visit the Company's
website at www.arianaresources.com.
Glossary of Technical Terms:
"Ag" Silver
"Au" Gold
"g/t" grams per tonne
"m" Metres
"oz" Ounces
Ends
Figure 1: http://hugin.info/138153/R/2075992/780668.pdf
This announcement is distributed by Nasdaq Corporate Solutions on behalf
of Nasdaq Corporate Solutions clients.
The issuer of this announcement warrants that they are solely
responsible for the content, accuracy and originality of the information
contained therein.
Source: Ariana Resources plc via Globenewswire
http://www.arianaresources.com/s/Home.asp
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February 06, 2017 02:00 ET (07:00 GMT)
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