E&L Deposit Garibaldi:
A successful 2016 summer exploration program confirmed the E&L as the first magmatic nickel-copper-rich massive sulphide system in the Eskay mining camp, featuring high nickel-copper tenors as well as platinum, palladium, cobalt and gold values in a pyrrhotite-pentlandite-chalcopyrite assemblage. Garibaldi geologists are now viewing the E&L at Nickel Mountain as a large-tonnage, high-grade exploration target within an intrusion defined over a length of 4 kilometers and a width of 1.5 kilometers.
Preliminary results from a 600 line kilometer VTEM survey completed in May 2017 support conclusions from reinterpreted historical data and fresh geological information collected by Garibaldi since last summer that sulphide mineralization at the E&L is much more widespread than originally understood.
An extensive field program at the E&L commences in June prior to a major summer drilling program aimed at confirming historical resources and discovering new zones of nickel-copper-rich sulphides. Nickel Mountain is in the immediate vicinity of such world class discoveries as Eskay Creek, Seabridge's KSM and Pretium's Brucejack high-grade gold mine that's scheduled to begin commercial production this year.
Highlights of recent E&L modeling:
Using inversion analysis for the aeromagnetics, outcrop maps, diamond drilling and trenching information, a model has been created of the E&L as an irregular lobate body with chambers and bulges connected by conduit dykes and pipes. Mineralized zones encountered through historic drilling occur at the southern margin of the largest chamber, up-plunge of an interpreted pipe connecting to the “Q” magnetic anomaly area to the south. Overall, the interpreted morphology features very encouraging distinctive forms, suggesting numerous possible traps and depositional sites for massive sulphide accumulation.
The E&L Intrusion features a younger sulphide mineralized olivine gabbro phase that has intruded a barren gabbro-diorite phase. As reported in the Company’s November 10, 2016, news release, continuous channel sampling across the widest part of a 12-meter mineralized zone at the E&L gave a tenor range of 4.8% to 8% nickel and 2.1% to 10.9% copper for the E&L in 100% sulfide based on a six-meter section of semi-massive and massive sulphides.
Rocks hosting the E&L Intrusion include Hazleton Group black shales, an abundant source of sulphur for the mineralizing process. A review of the abbreviated drill information available suggests that there may have been significant incorporation of country rocks during the E&L intrusive events.
At a regional scale, massive gravity signatures (see January 30, 2017, news release) suggest that a deep seated crustal structure focused intrusion and emplacement of a large mafic parent for the E&L system. These are fundamental characteristics of numerous nickel camps worldwide, including Voisey’s Bay, Norils’k, Raglan and others.
The "Q" Anomaly - Massive Sulphide Source Indicated
A broad magnetic anomaly, referred to as the "Q" given its circular shape and an intriguing "keel", measures approximately 1 km wide and is centered immediately southwest of the historical E&L adit, 550 meters due south of the original discovery at the top of Nickel Mountain and 390 meters below the surface outcrop. The broad characteristics of the anomaly suggests it has a deep source. The "Q" was never drill-tested or systematically investigated by previous explorers who were drawn to the showings at the top of Nickel Mountain.
Significantly, the "Q" Anomaly features a 600-meter-long magnetic keel trending south-southeast.
As seen elsewhere in deposits around the globe, the keel or "tail" could represent a feeder or conduit zone to a nickel-rich massive sulphide system as expressed by the main magnetic anomaly interpreted by Garibaldi's geophysical consultants. Another possibility is that the broad anomaly results from a gabbroic intrusive body, since magnetic gabbro is host to the mineralization at the top of Nickel Mountain. If so, mineralization could be associated with the gabbro and in particular within the magnetic keel.