Mining’s old guard needs strong medicine
A new report details subpar investor returns in the mining industry over the last decade, particularly big cap diversified companies which have not adapted to new realities.
Osisko Mining (TSX: OSK) has drilled 2 metres grading 67.1 g/t gold and 2.2 metres at 38.67 g/t gold at the Golden Bear discovery 1,000 metres from its high-grade Windfall gold deposit in the Abitibi greenstone belt, in Quebec.
The company’s 50,000-metre drill program has confirmed the Golden Bear discovery zone (D1) and intersected two new mineralized zones. Drilling 50 metres southeast of D1 has defined D2, a parallel gold zone. D3, a third parallel zone of significant sulphide mineralization, was drilled 200 metres southeast of D1. All three zones display visible gold.
Osisko made the Golden Bear discovery in June. The D1 discovery hole returned 6.7 metres grading 27.4 g/t gold from OSK-UB-21-232.
The new drill results have traced the D1 zone 170 metres along strike with a plunge to the east-northeast. Drill hole ODK-UB-21-273 returned 2 metres grading 67.1 g/t gold. Two other holes returned 2 metres at 14.9 g/t gold (OSK-UB-21-264) and 2.2 metres at 26.53 g/t gold (OSK-UB-21-272).
At the D2 zone, drilling returned 2 metres grading 62.15 g/t gold in hole OSK-UB-21-261.
The D3 zone is defined by one assay from hole OSK-UB-21-276: 2.2 metres grading 38.67 g/t gold. Assay results are pending from a second hole stepped out 250 metres east of the first hole.
Osisko says the Golden Bear is a “blind” discovery in a geological setting similar to Windfall. That deposit has an alteration and mineralized footprint of over a 4-km strike length and to a vertical extent of 3 km.
The Windfall preliminary economic assessment updated in April covered the Lynx, Underdog, Main and Triple 8 zones. The Lynx zone has a measured resource of 521,000 tonnes grading 11.3 g/t gold for 189,000 contained ounces. The indicated resource includes the Underdog and Main zones and is 5.5 million tonnes grading 9.4 g/t gold for 1.7 million contained ounces. The total inferred resource from all four zones is 16.4 million tonnes at 8 g/t gold for 4.2 million contained ounces.
(This article first appeared in the Canadian Mining Journal)
