Argus Completes Drill Program on Kaituma Uranium/Gold Project
posted on
Jul 09, 2012 10:03AM
Uranium, Gold and Base Metals.
Vancouver, B.C., July 9, 2012 - Argus Metals Corp. (the "Company" or "Argus") (TSX.V:AML) announces that, further to the Company's news release dated May 22, 2012, the Company has successfully completed its 2012 drill program on the Kaituma Uranium/Gold Project in north-west Guyana.
President Michael Collins stated, "The Kaituma uranium/gold project has been, up until now, one of the few undrilled uranium exploration targets with the scale necessary for a large scale discovery. With exceptional infrastructure in place, Argus' 2012 drilling program has quickly and efficiently tested this outstanding uranium target."
The Kaituma Uranium/Gold Project represents a geophysical/geochemical uranium target within an episyenite/leucogranite intrusive in Guyana Shield Greenstone Belt with similar geological model as deposits such as the alaskite hosted Husab deposit of Extract Resources Ltd. in Namibia, (319.9M lb U3O8 @ 519ppm U3O8) and the metasomatic albite hosted Lago Real Mine in Brazil which has resources of 125M lb U3O8 @ ~0.25% U3O8. The Kaituma geology model will become clearer with the chemical assay results and analysis of geology of this drill program. The high priority Kaituma uranium target has a strike of over 10 kilometres and a width of approximately one kilometre punctuated by grades from trace up to 0.23% U in saprolite trenches and from trace up to 0.0948% eU in weathered outcrop.
The reverse circulation drill program comprised 2,300 metres of a series of 17, ~150 metres deep drill holes over five north-south oriented fences that targeted uranium and gold anomalies identified through airborne and ground-based exploration work conducted by StrataGold, BHP Billiton ("BHP"), AREVA SA ("AREVA") (previously Cogema) and confirmed by the Company's own ground-based exploration programs in 2010. The drilling program tested approximately 8 kilometres of the strike length of the Kaituma radiometric anomaly over both the Kaituma West (PL 29/2011) and Kaituma East (PL 35/2010).
In total, 1,601 samples, including QA/QC standard and blank insertions, were collected during the reverse circulation drill program and delivered to Acme Analytical Laboratories preparation facility in Georgetown, Guyana by early July 2012. Chemical assays from the Kaituma 2012 drilling program are expected by August 2012.
Historically, the Kaituma Project has been explored by various companies including AREVA and BHP, with exploration work including airborne geophysics, ground-based geophysics, soil sampling and trenching. The Kaituma East and West PLs cover a suite of coincident radiometric/geochemical anomalies defined by a 1982 Cogema soil sampling and geophysical program, a 1996 BHP airborne radiometric survey and a StrataGold 2007 stream, soils and trenching program. The results of these programs have demonstrated a high level of correlation of results among operators and survey techniques.
Past work on the Kaituma West PL (PL29/2011) also identified three gold anomalies with grades from trace and up to 827 ppb Au (averaging 9 ppb) and demonstrates an association with both hydrothermal alteration in greenstones on the margins of the intrusive (Anomalies #1 and 2), and also shear related mineralization internal to the intrusive rock (Anomaly #3).
The Kaituma project is subject a 2% NSR with a provisional buy back of 0.75% of the NSR for $1,250,000 USD.
QA/QC
All samples were split on site at the Kaituma exploration camp, with A splits shipped to Acme Analytical Laboratories preparation facility in Georgetown, Guyana where samples were sorted and crushed to appropriate particle size (pulp) and representatively split to a smaller size for shipment to Acme's Santiago analysis facility for final assay via ACME Group 1EX 46-element ICP-MS analysis with a Multi-acid (HCl, HF, HNO3, HClO4) digestion. A comprehensive system of standards and blanks was implemented in the 2012 exploration drilling program and will be analyzed as chemical assay data become available. Paul D. Gray, P.Geo. is the Company's Qualified Person with respect to the Kaituma Project and has reviewed and approved this press release.