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Some
1,200 junior resource exploration and development companies are located in
Vancouver, British Columbia. Vancouver is well known as a hub for mining
expertise and is one of the greatest mining centers in the world.
Not
many of those 1200 companies can claim to have a mine, let alone one
with:
- A stable, just inspected permitted tailings
impound with room to grow
- Only a 6 km drive down an all weather gravel
road from the Coquihalla Highway to the mine site
- Power lines only six km away
- Old mill equipment and foundations still in
place
- Extensive mine workings
- Inferred gold resource of 686,540 ounces in two
ore bodies open in all directions
- Water and mining permit already in place
- Politically mining friendly jurisdiction
- Positive response from local community
New Carolin Gold Corp. TSX.V - LAD can
claim all that, and a whole lot more - it’s fully permitted mineproject sits
just 160 km east of Vancouver, close to the town of Hope. Workers can
complete their shifts and sleep in their own beds in their own homes.
Supplies can be easily sourced and transported to the mine site.
 New Carolin’s Ladner Gold Project
‘The
Coquihalla serpentine belt is an elongate, north - northwest trending,
steeply dipping ultramafic unit. The belt lies within a major crustal
fracture, the Hozameen fault and exceeds 50 kilometers in discontinuous
strike length. The serpentine belt reaches its maximum development in the
Carolin mine-Coquihalla River area, where it is greater than two kilometers
in width. It gradually narrows to the south (Manning Park area) and north
(Boston Bar).’ Exploration in B.C. 1989, Ministry of
Energy and Mines
The
Coquihalla Gold Belt (CGB) has geological similarities to the Mother Lode
district of California (7m ozs of gold) and the Bridge River district (4.1m
ozs of gold) of southwestern BC.
 New Carolin’s Ladner
Gold Property follows the Hozameen fault structure for approximately 28 km
and exceeds 144 square kilometers covering substantially all of the
accessible, yet still very underexplored, CGB.
The
Ladner Gold Project contains several former underground producing gold mines
and numerous gold prospects – more than 30 have been discovered so far.
Approximately
11 gold showings have been found within a 2 km stretch north of the Carolin
Mine.
Carolin Mine
The
Carolin Mine, a former underground gold producer from 1982 – 1984, is located
on the west fork of Ladner Creek, approximately 18 kilometers northeast of
Hope.
The
1,360 tpd mill at the mine was commissioned in early 1982 and produced over
43,500 ounces of gold during 27 months of operation
Construction
of the New Carolin Mine started in 1980 when gold’s price was US$600.00 an
ounce. When the first gold was poured gold was down to US$300.00 oz. With
poor gold recoveries (just 60%) and mined grades lower than forecast due to
country rock dilution the mine had to close in 1982.
The
original resource estimate was finalized in 1997. The gold resources reported
in the table below are historic estimates (not NI 43-101 compliant) based on
exploration and development work undertaken by Athabaska Gold Resources in
1995 and 1996 using a database of 595 diamond drill holes (approximately
40,000 meters of diamond drilling).
 
Currently
the Carolin Mine has a compliant Inferred Mineral Resource estimate of
607,000 oz gold @ 1.5 g/t in 12,352,124 tonnes at a cutoff grade of 0.5 g/t
gold.
Confirmation
drilling is required to bring the current resource up to the historic
numbers. The historic resource grade of plus 4 gpt was also much closer to
the average grade that was originally mined from the Idaho Zone (New Carolin
Mine).
The
Carolin Mine mineralized zone is open in all directions.
A mine
development map from 1981 shows the 800 level being extended north for 1.2 km
to the McMaster Zone. The proposed cross cuts for drilling indicate to this
author that previous operators had high confidence that gold mineralization
runs beyond the Carolin Mine and that the area between the Carolin Mine and
the McMaster zone could yield additional gold resources as development
continues.
There
are no shafts at the Carolin Mine and the underground workings are dry and
fully accessible.
The
future mine model for the Carolin Mine envisions open pit and underground
components.
McMaster Zone
The
McMaster Zone is approximately 1.3 km north of the Carolin Mine.
A New
Carolin May 2012 technical report established an inferred resource on the
McMaster zone of 3.6 million tonnes grading 0.69 gram gold for 79,540 oz.
gold using a 0.5 gram gold cut-off. Note that over half of this existing
resource is at 2 gpt and near surface.
Highlights
- The McMaster Zone occurs within the current
mine permit area and is open in all directions.
- The McMaster Zone resource takes into account
only gold. The silver accompanying the gold mineralization was not
included in the historical database.
- The current resource estimate doesn’t take into
account a gold oxide zone. If it continues to depth it could be
significant.
The
Emancipation Mine was an intermittent gold producer from 1916 to 1941.
The
Aurum, Pipestem and Ward adits all produced gold intermittently from 1935 to
1937.
There’s
also ‘Jewelry Box’ type gold showings present:
- The Montana - 30 oz’s gold from two tons of
material.
- Georgia No. 2 prospect - 33 oz’s of gold from
one ton of material.
Tailings Pond
Athabaska
Gold Resources drilled 60 holes into the tailings and New Carolin drilled
another nine. These 69 holes were drilled into just 60% of the tailings
pond’s surface area. They were used to establish a National Instrument 43-101
resource of 404,000 indicated tonnes grading 1.83 grams gold per tonne for
24,000 contained oz., plus 84,400 inferred tonnes grading 1.85 grams gold for
a further 5,000 oz gold.
Since
the Carolin Mine shut down the fully permitted tailings impoundment has been
monitored and inspected by independent consulting engineers. After the
Imperial Metals Mt. Polley tailings dam breach BC’s Ministry of Mines
mandated that all of the Provinces tailings impoundments be inspected and
reports filed by December 1, 2014. New Carolin completed its inspection in
September 2014. Remaining tailings capacity is 1,327,723 metric tonnes.
Metallurgy
Core
from the McMaster Zone (DDH 32-09; 3.96 g/t gold over 27.6 meters, from 32.4
to 60.0 meters) was provided to SGS Canada Ltd. for gold recovery testing.
Pressure-oxidation
and carbon-in-leach has shown recoveries of 96.3% on flotation concentrate
from the McMaster Zone. Using flotation, pressure oxidation and cyanidation -
combined with cyanidation of the flotation tailings - returned overall
recoveries of 94.5%.
Mineralization
of the McMaster Zone is similar to that of the Carolin Mine (no core is
available for testing).
The Plan
Management
is reviewing plans to set up a portable mill at the tailings pond which could
yield 25,000 oz. gold.
The
McMaster zone, because it’s a surface expression, has potential as an
open-pit mine and could supply additional mill feed.
There
is broken inventory underground at the Carolin mine totaling several thousand
tonnes - there was always several days of inventory stacked ahead of mining.
When the mine was shut down this inventory remained. This inventory could be
used to support the portable mill plan if found feasible or for bulk sampling
at a future date.
Obstacles
Nothing
worth doing is easy and New Carolin achieving 100% ownership of the Ladner
Gold Project is no exception (New Carolin currently owns 10% of the Ladner
Gold Project).
Although
the company has a deal in place with the Receivers to acquire the remaining
90% ownership interests, at the time of writing the company is still waiting
for a vesting order from the Quebec bankruptcy court to effect the transfer
of all mineral claims and land titles to the company.
“December 16, 2014- New Carolin Gold Corp. TSX-V: LAD
announces that, further to its August 27, 2014 press release, a vesting order
was granted by the Quebec Superior Court on December 2, 2014 in the Century
Mining Corporation ("Century") receivership proceedings to permit
the receiver to complete the acquisition agreement announced on August 27,
2014 pursuant to which the Company has the right to acquire all remaining
ownership interests in and to the Carolin Mine and the 144 sq kilometer
Ladner Gold Project.
The Quebec Court Vesting Order follows
the recent granting of an Ontario Court Vesting Order in the Tamerlane
Ventures Ltd. ("Tamerlane") receivership proceedings permitting
Tamerlane's receiver to sell its interests in the project to Century pursuant
to an outstanding option (the "Tamerlane Option") in order that
Century can transfer that interest to the Company pursuant to the acquisition
agreement. Tamerlane and Century are the two remaining owners of interests in
the project in addition to the Company. Both Vesting Orders are conditions of
closing of the acquisition agreement.
Upon completion of the acquisition
agreement the Company will have acquired 100% ownership of the Carolin Mine
and Ladner Gold Project, which will be the first time in over a decade that
title to the project has not been split among multiple parties.”
As an
additional condition of closing the deal, the company must also raise
$2,000,000 for property development.
Conclusion
Revitalizing
New Carolin’s Ladner Gold Project could make it a cornerstone industry for
the community of Hope, BC. But not only Hope, Vancouver as a mining hub and
the people of BC need projects like this to succeed to reap the social and
economic benefits that come from resource extraction.
As for
New Carolin’s shareholders, by processing the tailings and mining the current
resource at the McMaster Zone New Carolin should generate significant cash
flow. Money that can be used to potentially increase the already significant
resources at the McMaster Zone and New Carolin Mine and saving the company’s
investors considerable future dilution.
There’s
also considerable discovery upside left on the property. A recently completed
airborne geophysical survey indicated a major magnetic linear structure that
can be traced for over 18 km within the company's claims. All the
aforementioned gold prospects occur along this major magnetic anomaly and
there’s several kilometers of untested ground left along the structure to
explore.
Is New
Carolin Gold Corp. TSX.V – LAD on your radar screen?
If not,
maybe it should be.
Richard
lives with his family on a 160 acre ranch in northern British Columbia. He
invests in the resource and biotechnology/pharmaceutical sectors and is the
owner of Aheadoftheherd.com. His articles have been published on over 400
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***
Legal
Notice / Disclaimer
This
document is not and should not be construed as an offer to sell or the
solicitation of an offer to purchase or subscribe for any investment.
Richard
Mills has based this document on information obtained from sources he
believes to be reliable but which has not been independently verified.
Richard
Mills makes no guarantee, representation or warranty and accepts no
responsibility or liability as to its accuracy or completeness. Expressions
of opinion are those of Richard Mills only and are subject to change without
notice. Richard Mills assumes no warranty, liability or guarantee for the
current relevance, correctness or completeness of any information provided
within this Report and will not be held liable for the consequence of
reliance upon any opinion or statement contained herein or any omission.
Furthermore,
I, Richard Mills, assume no liability for any direct or indirect loss or
damage or, in particular, for lost profit, which you may incur as a result of
the use and existence of the information provided within this Report.
Richard
owns shares in New Carolin Gold Corp. TSX.V – LAD
New
Carolin is an advertiser on Richard’s site aheadoftheherd.com.
This
article is not paid for content.
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