Sterling Metals begins maiden drill program at Sail Pond, shares surge

MINING.COM Staff Writer | June 15, 2021 | 9:20 am Exploration Markets Canada Silver

Sail Pond project area viewing north from the South Zone. Credit: Sterling Metals

Sterling Metals Corp. (TSXV:SAG) announced on Tuesday it has begun a maiden drill program on the Sail Pond silver-base metals project in Newfoundland, Canada.

The drilling follows high-grade assay results from soil sampling on the project earlier this year, which confirmed a 12km linear anomaly with grades of up to 657 g/t Ag and 0.68% Cu.

This drill program will comprise of an initial 7,500 metres with one drill, and is expected to take approximately four months to complete. With help from technology service provider GoldSpot Discoveries Corp., a total of 18 priority drill target locations and 12,485 metres of drill targets have been identified.

Initial drill holes will target the South Zone, where previous exploration campaigns have identified high-grade mineralization with grab sample results up to 4,526.1 g/t Ag, 0.9 g/t Au, 14.9% Cu, 7.5% Pb, 5.0% Sb, and 9.6% Zn.

“Since acquiring this project in October of last year, each data point generated has progressively given us greater confidence in our Sail Pond asset. With our fully funded 7,500m program, and the plan and funds to expand well beyond this first program, we look forward to seeing what lies beneath this at surface 12km, district-scale, high-grade project,” Sterling CEO Mathew Wilson said in a news release.

The company has also received results and interpretation of a gravity survey completed by GoldSpot in March over the South Zone, which will assist with drill targeting. A linear trend consisting of gravity-high anomalies has been identified, which the company says correlates well with both metal-in-soil anomalies and high-grade grab samples.

Discovered in 2016, the Sail Pond property covers an area of 13,500 hectares in the Great Northern Peninsula. Sterling currently has the option to earn 100% of this project by spending a total of C$2 million within two years.

Shares of Sterling Metals surged nearly 20% by noon Toronto time. The junior miner has a market capitalization of C$22.2 million.