Resource World Magazine

44 www.resourceworld.com F E B R U A R Y / M A R C H 2 0 1 7 ESKAY MINING looking to advance SIB Project by Thomas Schuster ESKAY MINING CORP. [ESK-TSXV] controls 130,000 hectares surrounding Barrick Gold's [ABX-TSX, NYSE] famous Eskay Creek VMS deposit and mine in the prolific Golden Triangle of northwest British Columbia. Annual production for this high-grade mine was 320,784 oz gold and 15.5 million oz silver averaging 1.38 oz/ton gold and 71 oz/ton silver. The mine saw 14 years of production from 1995 to 2008. Eskay Mining's overall land position is extensive, covering very prospective ground near four significant deposits. Part of this land position, about 55,000 hectares, is held in a joint ven - ture (80% Eskay, earned-in from St. Andrew Goldfields (now Kirkland Lake Gold Inc. [KL-TSX]) and is referred to as the ESK-JV Claims. A large contiguous claim block stretches in a broad concave- east arc from the area of the past-producing Eskay Creek mine on the north, southward down the west side of Seabridge Gold's resource-rich KSM property. The southern end of this contiguous claim block is referred to as the Corey property and is wholly- owned by Eskay Mining. The other holdings include the North Mitchell block (1,200 hectares), which lies north of Pretium Resources' Brucejack- Snowfield property and immediately east of Seabridge's Fe Cap Au-Cu deposit. The final piece of Eskay Mining's land-holdings, the New Eskay tenure (570 hectares), lies west of the northern end of the main property. For the most part, Eskay has focused its attention on the SIB Project, (part of the ESK-JV claims) where the productive strati - graphic horizons of the Eskay mine extend onto the property. The prospective Eskay rhyolite and mineralized mudstone have been traced southward from the mine to the Lulu zone where high grades were intersected in the hanging wall of the Coulter Creek thrust fault (CCTF) not long after the discovery of the Eskay Creek deposit. For example, drill hole 90-30 intersected 14.3 metres averaging 14.43 g/t gold and 1,060 g/t silver. Further exploration drilling in that period, however, suggested that the Lulu zone and the associated host rocks were truncated by the thrust fault. In 2008 and 2010, drill-testing showed that the Eskay rhyolite exists in the footwall of the thrust and that displacement on it was not large. The company therefore believes that there is excellent potential remains for discovery beneath the thrust. Eskay intends to drill-test this highly prospective footwall stratigraphy with a systematic deep-drilling program. Permits are now in place to do so, and a 60% interest was recently farmed-out to a major com - pany on what amounts to about 10% of the SIB property. Kirkland Lake retains a right of first refusal to match the pro- posal and this right will remain in effect for approximately ten days beyond the time this article went to press. Meanwhile, field work completed last summer on part of the Corey property farther to the south identified rocks that are believed to be similar in age, lithology, and alteration to those hosting the Eskay Creek deposit. These rocks also underlie most of the area to the east and southeast, in the Ted Morris Creek area, which had been regarded previously as being underlain by older rocks. Preliminary soil and rock geochemical sampling in that area yielded anomalous precious metals values, along with very strongly anomalous "pathfinder" elements such as As, Sb, Cu, Pb, Mo and Zn, that are characteristic of 'Eskay-style' mineralization. The North Mitchell block of Eskay's ESK-JV Claims was also mapped in 2016, and a number of rock and soil geochemical samples were collected from this area. Not surprisingly, the style and intensity of alteration at lower stratigraphic levels on the block has been found to be similar to that associated with min - eral deposits throughout the Sulphurets camp, and the structural and stratigraphic setting bears distinct and attractive similarities to the adjoining Brucejack and Treaty Creek properties. The com- pany plans further exploration on this block. Another focus for fieldwork was in the Big Red area, situated on the Corey property near the south end of the Eskay holdings. There, approximately 25 grab samples from altered volcaniclastic rocks consistently yielded very highly anomalous copper, molyb - denum and tungsten values, with locally anomalous silver and gold. The geochemical signature, the extent of alteration and the density of veining all suggest that the area warrants follow-up exploration. Eskay Mining currently has a market capitalization of about $20 million and management owns approximately 15% of the issues shares of the company. n GOLDEN TRIANGLE The Corey property with a view west-northwest from the Red Lightning showing toward the rusty-weathering band across Mt. Madge which marks the C10 showing. Photo courtesy Eskay Mining Corp.

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