Vancouver, B.C., Metallic Minerals Corp. (TSX-V: MMG; US OTC: MMNGF) (“Metallic Minerals” or the “Company”) is pleased to announce that it has acquired 100% interest in 53.5 square kilometres (“km2”) of new mineral properties in the Keno Hill silver district of Canada’s Yukon Territory. These properties have potential to host Keno type high-grade silver-lead-zinc mineralization and are adjacent to, or contiguous with, Metallic Minerals’ Keno Silver property and Alexco Resource Corp’s Keno Hill properties (see Figure 1) and bring the Company’s total district land position to 166 km2.
Figure 1: Keno District Property map
Greg Johnson, Metallic Minerals’ Chairman & CEO stated, "We are very pleased to have been able to acquire these additional prospective properties in the high-grade Keno Hill silver district, which has produced over 200 million ounces of silver. With over 100 years of mining history in the Keno Hill silver district, the geological controls are well-understood and, in recent years, the team at Alexco has made several major new discoveries through their systematic exploration in the district along the known mineralized structural corridors. Metallic’s 166 km2 land position is the second largest in the prolific Keno Hill camp and is traversed by 10 of the 12 known mineralized trends in the district. The property hosts 8 historic producing mines, five of which had average grades in excess of 5,000 g/t Ag1. We are currently wrapping up our inaugural field program at the Keno Silver Project and we anticipate receiving initial results over the coming weeks from our core drilling and surface sampling programs. The results of that work and these newly acquired targets will be incorporated into our developing geologic modelling work and will help direct our 2018 exploration season plans and targeting.”
1CATHRO, R. J. (Bob). Great Mining Camps of Canada 1. The History and Geology of the Keno Hill Silver Camp, Yukon Territory. Geoscience Canada, [S.l.], Sept. 2006. ISSN 1911-4850
Formo (Yukeno) Property
Metallic Minerals has acquired 19 mining leases in the Keno Hill silver district from Independence Gold Corp. with 13 of these leases covering the historic Formo mine, also known as the Yukeno mine. The main showings on the Formo property are two kilometres northeast of the historic Hector-Calumet mine, which was the largest producer in the Keno Hill silver district producing nearly 100 million ounces of silver1. The recent major Bermingham discovery for Alexco is located approximately 1.5 km to the southwest of Hector-Calumet in the same structural corridor.
The main Formo vein structures are exposed at surface in an open cut along the Silver Trail highway roughly halfway between Elsa and Keno City. The Formo vein structures are primarily hosted by greenstones below the main Keno Hill Quartzite. Historic production from the Formo veins averaged 5,092 grams per tonne (g/t) silver (Ag) or 148.9 ounces per ton (oz/t) Ag and the last production from the site was in 1983. At least 3 vein structures have been identified at Formo in underground workings, drilling and trenching. Six core holes were drilled on the Formo property along with 54 percussion holes in 1980-1981. Formo's 1931 shipment graded approximately 7,886 g/t Ag and 60% Pb. The 1961 shipment graded 4,957.6 g/t Ag, 57% Pb and 10.3% Zn. In 1965, D. Campbell estimated a mineral resource of 39,917 tonnes grading 16,548.6 g/t Ag, 6.9% Pb and 10.7% Zn. (A qualified person has not done sufficient work to classify the historical estimate as current mineral resources or mineral reserves within the definitions and standards outlined in National Instrument 43-101. The Company is not treating the historical estimate as current mineral resources or mineral reserves and cautions that this estimate should not be relied upon)2.
2Report on the Geology, Geochemistry and Trenching of the Keno Hill Area Subleases and Working Permits, Dawson Eldorado Mines Ltd., Philip D. Van Angeren (P.Geo) and Paul S. White (P.Eng); February 13, 1987 and 2002 Summary Report on the Keno Mining Leases, for Southern Rio Resources, Jean Pautler, P. Geo, June 20, 2002
Three additional leases were also acquired from Independence Gold adjacent to the highway and closer to Keno City. This includes the Brook lease on the Eagle vein structural corridor and the Cimarron and Caribbean leases located directly north of Alexco’s Onek mine. The Onek mine produced 1.2 million ounces of silver and contains an Indicated Resource of 700,200 tonnes grading 190 g/t Ag, 0.6 g/t Au, 1.2% Pb and 11.9% Zn or 844 g/t Ag Eq. containing 4.2 million ounces of silver within the prospective Keno Hill Quartzite.3
3Alexco Resource Corp. News Release dated March 29, 2017 entitled “Alexco and Silver Wheaton Amend Silver Purchase Agreement and Alexco Announces Positive Preliminary Economic Assessment for Expanded Silver Production at Keno Hill.”
Keno Summit Properties
Metallic Minerals has also acquired 5 additional claims and leases in the Keno Summit area. Keno Hill was the site of a staking rush following the discovery in 1919 of the high-grade silver veins of the No. 9 system on Keno Summit. No.9’s high-grade shoots had average silver grades from mine records of 6,960 g/t or 203 oz/ton silver and stimulated the development of the Keno Hill camp. The Keno Summit area consists of a series of targets and small historic producing mines with the largest production from the historic Keno Hill mine itself, which produced 12.7 million ounces from quartzite and greenstone hosted deposits. These vein systems and additional subparallel vein systems run northeast across Keno Hill and trend across the new leases and claims with potential to host Keno Hill style high-grade silver mineralization in both quartzite and greenstone hosted targets.
Three new leases in the Keno Summit area were acquired from Independence Gold and expand Metallic’s holdings at the Silver Basin target. The Silver Basin mine was discovered in the early 1920s and was a small high-grade silver producer grading 5,739 g/t Ag (185 oz/t) with 41% Pb located on the north side of Keno Hill. Silver Basin is thought to be part of the Flame and Moth structural zone, which hosts an Indicated resource of 1.68 million tonnes grading 498 g/t Ag, 0.4 g/t Au, 1.9% Pb, and 5.3% Zn or 851 g/t Ag Eq. containing 26.9 million ounces of silver3. There are 5 known vein structures at Silver Basin hosted in both quartzite and greenstones. Trench samples from 2008 returned up to 2382 g/t Ag, 48.5% Pb and 8.10 g/t Au. These samples are not necessarily representative of all the mineralization hosted in the area.
Keno East Properties
Metallic Minerals also acquired and staked additional ground in the Keno East target area, which covers the eastern and southern extension of the main Keno Hill Quartzite unit, as well as several areas with prospective greenstone targets. Metallic had previously acquired the Gram property earlier in 2017 from Strategic Metals in this target area. The new combined Keno East land position now covers the 4 known mineralized structural zones covering the eastern end of the Keno Hill silver district. Trenching in the area returned high-grade silver and base metal values including 857 g/t silver and 7.7% lead and 446 g/t silver and 0.2% lead. Soil sampling has identified a 4 km2 zone of anomalous Ag, Au and base metals Pb, Zn and Cu, along with 5 other areas with elevated geochemical responses. An airborne geophysical survey over the property identified a number of target areas for further follow up.