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VANCOUVER,
April 10, 2013 /CNW/ - Ecuador Gold
& Copper Corp. (TSX-V: EGX), (the "Company" or
"EGX") is pleased to announce assay results from drill hole
DSB-22 at its Santa Barbara gold-copper porphyry deposit. The Santa
Barbara deposit is located within the Company's 8,300 hectare
Condor Gold and Copper Project in the Zamora Gold and Copper Belt,
Southeast Ecuador. Drill
hole DSB-22 returned significant results including 266m averaging
0.99g/t Au and 0.14% Cu within a continuously mineralized 484m
interval that averaged 0.80 g/t Au starting at 190m. Best
gold grades were encountered from 238m to 368m (130m) where grades
ranged consistently over 1.00 g/t Au up to 2.3 g/t Au, averaging
1.23 g./t Au and 0.17% Cu. Assay results are described in the
table below.
DSB-22 is the fourth hole completed at Santa
Barbara since August 2012 as part of
the previously announced Phase I drill program on the Company's
Condor Gold and Copper Project. This hole was drilled to 677m at
-75 degrees parallel to and southeast of DSB-21 where previously
released results showed 350 meters of 0.74 g/t Au including 206
meters grading 1.01 g/t Au (see Company News Release, February 26, 2013). DSB-21 intersected the
main gold zone approximately 50m south of previous intercepts and
DSB-22 extends mineralization a further 100m to the
southeast. The Santa Barbara South Zone currently hosts an NI
43-101 compliant inferred resource of 21.0 Mt of 1.00 g/t Au
(675,000 oz) while the Santa Barbara North zone (500m to the
northeast), contains a further inferred resource of 5.0 Mt of 0.90
g/t Au (145,000 oz). For further details see the Company's
web site at www.ecuadorgoldandcopper.com or the June 14, 2012 Technical Report at
www.sedar.com.
Table 1 summarizes the assay results for DSB-22
and previous results from EGX Phase I drilling at Santa
Barbara.
Table 1: Summary of Phase I drill
results from Santa Barbara (length weighted average assays,
uncapped)
| Drill Hole |
From
(m) |
To
(m) |
Interval
(m) |
Au (g/t) |
Cu (%) |
AuEq (g/t) |
| DSB-19 |
180.00 |
600.00 |
420.00 |
0.57 |
0.08 |
0.68 |
| including |
191.54 |
293.20 |
101.66 |
1.02 |
0.11 |
1.17 |
| and |
344.10 |
477.00 |
132.90 |
0.62 |
0.10 |
0.75 |
| DSB-20 |
0.00 |
400.00 |
400.00 |
0.10 |
0.06 |
0.18 |
| DSB-21 |
68.00 |
418.00 |
350.00 |
0.74 |
0.11 |
0.89 |
| including |
100.00 |
354.00 |
254.00 |
0.90 |
0.12 |
1.06 |
| Including |
100.00 |
306.00 |
206.00 |
1.01 |
0.12 |
1.17 |
| including |
140.00 |
228.00 |
88.00 |
1.35 |
0.14 |
1.54 |
| DSB-22 |
190.00 |
674.00 |
484.00 |
0.80 |
0.13 |
0.97 |
| including |
190.00 |
620.00 |
430.00 |
0.86 |
0.14 |
1.05 |
| Including |
238.00 |
504.00 |
266.00 |
0.99 |
0.14 |
1.18 |
| including |
238.00 |
368.00 |
130.00 |
1.23 |
0.17 |
1.45 |
- g/t = grams per metric tonne.
- Gold equivalent grade (AuEq) is calculated assuming 90%
recovery of copper with a $3.00/lb.
long term price of copper and $1400
long term price for gold.
- The true width of down hole interval lengths are estimated
to be approximately 25% to 50%.
The attached map - Figure 1 shows the location of
the drill holes that have been drilled or planned to be drilled on
the Santa Barbara deposit. Two drills are currently drilling holes
DSB-24 and DSB-25.
Commentary
Drill hole DSB-22 intersected almost continuous
gold and copper mineralization over 484 meters from 190m to 674m
grading an average of 0.80 g/t gold and 0.13% Cu over the
interval. The Santa Barbara South Zone remains open to the
north, east and south. Porphyry gold-copper mineralization is
hosted by altered basaltic andesite intruded by Jurassic intrusive
stocks and dikes. Major structural orientations are exhibited by
steeply dipping intrusive contacts, porphyry B-type quartz veins
and faults striking northwest and northeast. The 40km long
Zamora Gold and Copper Belt in Southeastern Ecuador is host to
Ecuacorriente's Mirador, Panantza and San Carlos copper porphyry
deposits and Kinross's Fruta del
Norte epithermal gold deposit of the same age. The Company
cautions that reference to the nearby deposits is for information
purposes only and there is no assurance that its Condor gold and
copper concessions will develop into economically viable producing
deposits.
Phase I Drill Program
The Santa Barbara gold - copper porphyry deposit is
one of four targets including two epithermal gold targets (Los
Cuyes, and Soledad) in the northern part of the Condor Gold and
Copper concessions together with the promising El Hito
copper-molybdenum porphyry target located 5km east of Santa Barbara
that have been prioritized for resource expansion drilling by the
Company (see Company News Releases, January
30, 2013 and March 5, 2013 for
recent drill results at Los Cuyes and El Hito).
Drilling at Santa Barbara continues with two drill
rigs. The Company is currently planning additional holes to
extend mineralization to the south and east of the current
resource. Drill hole DSB-23 has been completed and assay
results are awaited.
Drilling completed on the Company's Condor Gold and
Copper Project to the end of March, 2013 totaled approximately
8,900 meters.
The Phase 1 Drill Program has been extended to
approximately 13,000 meters and is scheduled to be completed by the
end of May 2013.
Existing Resources
The Condor Gold Project contains a Measured &
Indicated Mineral Resource of 1.52 million ounces gold (within 50.4
Mt grading 0.94 g/t gold). Additional Inferred Mineral Resources
contain 1.28 million ounces gold (within 28.4 Mt grading 1.4
g/t gold). The measured resource consists of 54,000 ounces of gold
(within 147.0 Mt grading 1.0 g/t gold) and the indicated resources
consist of 1.47 million ounces gold (within 50.3 Mt grading
0.94 g/t). For more information, please see the Company's
resource table at www.ecuadorgoldandcopper.com or its Technical
Report dated June 14, 2012 which is
available under the Company's profile on SEDAR at
www.sedar.com.
Quality Assurance
The Company has implemented a quality assurance and
quality control program to ensure that the transport, sampling and
analysis of all samples is conducted in accordance with the best
possible practices. Drill core is transported from the drill by
employees to the Company's secure core logging facility at its camp
where, after geotechnical and geological logging, it is marked for
sampling. The entire hole is sampled and core samples are
generally 2m in length, varying at geological contacts to between
1.5m and 2.5m and are split in half by EGX employees. One
half is retained in a secure storage facility and the other half is
transported by EGX employees or a bonded courier to ACME Labs'
sample preparation facility in Cuenca, Ecuador where the core sample is crushed so
that 80% passes a 10 mesh screen and a 250g split is pulverized so
that 85% passes a 200 mesh screen. From Cuenca ACME Labs
ships the samples to their laboratory in Santiago, Chile for analysis. The lab is
ISO/IEC 17025:2005 (CAN-P-4E) certified. Where appropriate, samples
are analyzed for gold by 30-gm fire assay with an AA finish and by
gravimetric methods for assays over 10 ppm. Samples are analyzed
for silver and copper by ICP-ES after a four acid digestion.
For silver assays over 200 ppm, samples are analyzed using ACME
Labs 7AR method consisting of hot aqua regia digestion and ICP-ES
analysis. Copper assays over 10,000 ppm are re-analyzed using four
acid digestion with ICP-ES finish (ACME Labs 7TD method).
ACME Labs are independent from the Company.
Under the Company's QA-QC procedures, samples are
submitted for re-analysis based on their proximity to a certified
reference standard that returns a value greater than three standard
deviations higher or lower than the mean value for that standard.
In addition, any two consecutive reference standards falling
outside the two standard deviation threshold will be considered to
have failed. Since every twentieth sample is a reference standard,
ten samples above and below a failed standard will be re-analyzed.
The same protocol will be applied to duplicate samples considered
to have unacceptably divergent gold values. Periodically, random
samples will be submitted to another laboratory as an external
check on the results provided by the primary lab.
Qualified Person
Mit Tilkov, P.Geo., Vice-President Exploration of
Ecuador Gold and Copper Corp. is the qualified person, as defined
by National Instrument 43-101, supervised the project field work,
and is responsible for the preparation of the technical information
in this release.
Cautionary Note
The Company has not completed a preliminary
economic assessment or feasibility study of the Condor Gold Project
under National Instrument 43-101, and there is no assurance that
the exploration and subsequent development operations of the Condor
Gold Project will be economically or technically viable.
Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its
Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the
policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for
the adequacy or accuracy of this release.
SOURCE Ecuador Gold and Copper Corp.
Image with caption: "The attached map - Figure 1 shows the
location of the drill holes that have been drilled or planned to be
drilled on the Santa Barbara deposit. Two drills are currently
drilling holes DSB-24 and DSB-25. (CNW Group/Ecuador Gold and
Copper Corp.)". Image available at:
http://photos.newswire.ca/images/download/20130410_C4061_PHOTO_EN_25374.jpg