VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA--(Marketwire - Dec. 11, 2012) - Golden Dawn Minerals Inc. (News - Market indicators)(FRANKFURT:3G8N) (the "Company" or "Golden Dawn") is pleased to announce the release of the second and updated National Instrument 43-101 compliant Mineral Resource Estimate for the Deadwood Gold Zone, located within the Company's 3,000 hectare Wild Rose - Tam O'Shanter Property near Greenwood, British Columbia, Canada. The Company has received a summary report from APEX Geoscience Ltd. ("APEX") that describes an updated Inferred Mineral Resource Estimate of 24.5 million tonnes grading 0.53 grams per tonne (g/t) gold (Au), totaling 415,000 troy ounces of gold at a cut-off grade of 0.3 g/t Au (Table 1). A sensitivity analysis of the grade and tonnage relationships has been completed and is shown in the accompanying Table 1 below.
Table 1 - Inferred Mineral Resource Estimate at various cut off grades for gold.*
Lower
Cut Off
(g/t Au) |
Metric Tonnes (t) |
Average Gold
Grade (g/t) |
**Troy
Ounces (oz) |
| 0.1 |
54,511,000 |
0.35 |
610,000 |
| 0.2 |
40,233,000 |
0.42 |
541,000 |
| 0.3 |
24,483,000 |
0.53 |
415,000 |
| 0.4 |
14,692,000 |
0.65 |
306,000 |
| 0.5 |
9,137,000 |
0.77 |
226,000 |
| 0.6 |
6,020,000 |
0.89 |
171,000 |
| 0.7 |
3,650,000 |
1.04 |
122,000 |
| 0.8 |
2,515,000 |
1.18 |
95,000 |
| 0.9 |
1,863,000 |
1.30 |
78,000 |
| 1 |
1,635,000 |
1.34 |
71,000 |
| 1.2 |
936,000 |
1.54 |
46,000 |
| 1.4 |
422,000 |
1.83 |
25,000 |
| 1.6 |
251,000 |
2.07 |
17,000 |
*Inferred Mineral Resources are not Mineral Reserves. Inferred Mineral Resources do not have demonstrated economic viability, and may never be converted into Reserves.
**Contained ounces may not add due to rounding.
The Wild Rose - Tam O'Shanter project is considered to be an early stage project, therefore little is known about the potential mining or metallurgical characteristics of the Deadwood Gold Zone. However, the resource is considered to exhibit reasonable prospects for economic extraction at today's prices for gold. The base case cut-off threshold of 0.3 g/t Au, which yields 24.5 million tonnes at an average grade of 0.53 g/t Au and is detailed in Table 1 above, is considered appropriate based on the project's current size, favorable location for access, power, water, labour force and other assumptions derived from deposits of similar type and scale.
Potential for Resource Expansion
Current drilling, together with historic drilling results, has now confirmed the presence of a significant widespread alteration zone (the Deadwood Gold Zone) comprising low-grade gold-copper (Au-Cu) mineralization along a strike length of approximately 1,000 m. The zone has an apparent horizontal width of up to 160 m and has been tested to a vertical depth of approximately 280 m below surface. The Deadwood Gold Zone remains open in all directions. Certain portions of the resource include elevated concentrations of silver, lead and zinc. APEX recommends further drilling, including infill drilling and drilling along strike, in order to increase the size of the deposit and convert portions of the resource to the indicated category. Further modeling in conjunction with pit optimization studies are recommended once further drilling is completed. These studies in conjunction with new drilling and the current price of gold may facilitate the use of a lower cut off such as 0.2 g/t (the cut off utilized at the Spanish Mountain Deposit; see Giroux and Koffyberg, 2012), which will also aid in increasing the overall ounces of gold for the deposit. Further drilling will commence mid to late February subject to financing.
"The release of the updated National Instrument 43-101 compliant mineral resource estimate for the Deadwood gold deposit is a major milestone for the Company. It provides Golden Dawn with a strong base from which to build additional gold resources in 2013 through further drilling at the Deadwood Gold Zone and at other high-priority target zones within the Wild Rose and Tam O'Shanter properties," says Wolf Wiese, the CEO of the Company.
Mineral Resource Estimate
The second Mineral Resource Estimate for the Deadwood Gold Zone was prepared under the direction of Michael Dufresne, P.Geol., and Steve Nicholls, MAIG, of APEX. The current inferred resource is the result of an 8 hole Diamond drilling program completed in late 2011 along with the 12 hole Diamond drilling program which began in late 2010 and was completed in early 2011, together with 43 historical Diamond drill holes from multiple earlier drill campaigns from 1986 to 2004. The 2010 - 2011 drilling program was conducted under the direct supervision of Mr. Dufresne and Mr. Turner of APEX. All samples were sent to Inspectorate Exploration & Mining Services Ltd. ("Inspectorate") of Vancouver, BC, for standard fire assay and multi-element geochemical analysis for gold and trace metals. APEX employed a comprehensive QA/QC protocol with respect to drill hole and analytical data that, for the latter, included the insertion and monitoring of an appropriate number of standards, duplicates and blanks into the stream of drill core samples.
The resource model was generated using a total of 61 Diamond core holes, with an average drill hole spacing of 50 to 100 m for the Deadwood Gold Zone and 20 m for the Wild Rose - Wild Cat zone. The database consists of a total of 1750 composites of 1.5 m length, capped at 5.0 g/t Au for the Deadwood Gold Zone and 8.0 g/t Au for the Wild Rose - Wild Cat Zone. The mineral resource was estimated by inverse distance squared within a three dimensional mineralization envelope with similar geological characteristics in terms of alteration, mineralogy and gold grades using a 0.1 g/t cutoff grade. A search ellipsoid of 70 m x 25 m x 3 m orientated along strike (085°) was utilized for grade interpolation for the Deadwood Gold Zone, and 30 m x 20 m x 7 m along strike (120°) for the Wild Rose - Wild Cat Zone. A nominal density of 2.86 t/m3 has been applied to all blocks.
In April 2011, Golden Dawn directed Inspectorate to initiate preliminary metallurgical test work by conducting Bottle Roll Leach tests on a 60 m (60 sample) section of hole 11WR010, which exhibited geology, alteration and mineralization typical of the Deadwood Gold Zone. The data from the bottle roll leach tests, which were conducted on approximately 1 kg of sample material per sample, has been compared to original fire assay results and shows a correlation of 0.9798. Overall, the bottle roll leach tests report an unweighted average of 92% of the "total gold" established by fire assay. This preliminary data indicates that the Deadwood gold mineralization would be amenable to cyanide leaching.
Geology of the Deadwood Gold Deposit
Drilling during 2010 - 2011 indicates that the Deadwood Gold Zone is hosted in a remarkably consistent upper stratigraphic package with quartz-veined, brecciated and hornfelsed sediments and mafic volcanic rocks with minor dioritic intrusive units overlying a lower package of thinly bedded siltstones, sandstones and minor conglomerates. The upper portion of the stratigraphy exhibits moderate to intense silicification and consistent disseminated sulphide mineralization, which is associated with biotite (potassic) alteration that, in turn, yields remarkably consistent low-grade gold mineralization. The new drilling indicates that the Deadwood Gold Zone most likely incorporates the higher grade Wild Rose and Wild Cat veins. Within this large low-grade Au-Cu mineralized zone, discreet quartz veining has been occasionally encountered that returned higher-grade results similar to the Wild Rose and Wild Cat vein system to the southeast. As the drilling has moved to the southeast portion of the Deadwood Zone portions of the resource contain increased concentrations of silver plus or minus lead and zinc.
The resource estimate reported in this press release was prepared by Michael Dufresne, P.Geol., and Steve Nicholls, MAIG, of APEX Geoscience Ltd., all Qualified Persons as defined by National Instrument 43-101. Mr. Dufresne have reviewed and verified the contents of this release. A National Instrument 43-101compliant technical report will be filed with SEDAR within 45 days of the date of this press release.
On behalf of the Board of Directors:
GOLDEN DAWN MINERALS INC.
Wolf Wiese, President/Chief Executive Officer
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