Benchmark Metals Inc announced the results from infill drilling at the Cliff Mid Zone at its flagship Lawyers Gold-Silver Project, reporting higher-grade gold and silver mineralization, which were earlier unrecognized in the area.
The Edmonton, Alberta-based company shared that it drilled 3.05 meters (m) core length of 56.65 grams per tonne (g/t) gold and 79.75 g/t silver within 68.58m core length of 3.07 g/t gold and 11.72 g/t silver in drill hole 21CCRC020.
Benchmark's flagship Lawyers Gold-Silver Project is located within a road-accessible region of the prolific Golden Horseshoe area of north-central British Columbia, Canada.
READ: Benchmark Metals intersects high-grade gold and silver at the Marmot Zone in British Columbia
"The Cliff Creek Mid Zone is now not only expanding at depth but also to the east with higher-grade gold and silver mineralization. The new gold-silver mineralization begins near-surface and was previously unrecognized in this area,” CEO John Williamson said in a statement.
He added: “This type of near-surface higher-grade mineralization will have a positive impact on the Preliminary Economic Analysis (PEA) by delivering early year's material in the production schedule. Benchmark has planned additional diamond drilling to focus on expanding this zone."
Benchmark said that the discovery indicates a number of advantages, including conversion of previously-modeled waste in the resource model to mineralized domains; the ability to expand the pit shells as the resource grows, and near-surface high-grade mineralization which generates flexibility and potential for higher-grade starter pits.
These new results are defining strong continuity of gold and silver mineralization over 50 meters and the system remains open along strike. A number of new drill holes have been planned to follow-up on this zone looking to extend it along strike to the northwest and southeast.
The exploration company said that the Infill drilling on the east side of the Cliff Creek Mid Zone had intersected near-surface high-grade and bulk-tonnage mineralization in a portion of the Mid Zone that was thought to be weakly to modestly mineralized based upon intermittently sampled historical drilling.
The results, however, have the potential to add significant, higher-grade gold and silver ounces in an updated mineral resource estimate.
Benchmark's Lawyer's Gold-Silver project consists of three mineralized deposits that remain open for expansion, in addition to over 20 new target areas along a 20-kilometer trend.
Contact Ritika at ritika@proactiveinvestors.com