Anacortes Mining Corp announced that its wholly-owned Peruvian subsidiary, Aurifera Tres Cruces SA (ATC), has received final approval to begin drilling at its Tres Cruces gold project from the Peruvian Ministry of Energy and Mines (MINEM).
The site preparation and drilling contractors are currently mobilizing to the site and drilling is scheduled to begin the week of May 16, the company said.
The initial drilling program will consist of 3,000 meters (m) to 4,000 m of core drilling, which will include infill drilling of the known oxide resource, metallurgical holes, and will test previous high-grade intercepts that ended in gold and silver mineralization, the company added.
READ: Anacortes Mining awards contract for Phase 1 drilling campaign at Tres Cruces to Peru's Remicsa Drilling
As previously announced, ATC selected ALS Global's Peruvian subsidiary, ALS Perú SA, to carry out the assay services for the drilling campaign.
"We are pleased to receive this final authorization from MINEM, and are excited to be starting our Phase I drilling program next week,” CEO Jim Currie said in a statement. “We are looking forward to testing holes that Barrick had drilled previously that ended in strong gold and silver mineralization, particularly Hole RTC-255, where the bottom 173.0 meters of the hole from 92 m to 265 m had an average grade of 3.12 grams per ton (g/t) of gold."
Tres Cruces is one of the highest-grade oxide deposits globally and hosts oxide plus sulfide indicated resources of 2,474,000 ounces at 1.65 g/t gold.
Anacortes is fully funded for this drilling program and its exploration and development activities into 2023, the company said.
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