B2Gold has provided the Company with initial drill results from a 12 hole, 2,124 metre drill program on the Pampa Paciencia epithermal gold silver project.
This property, along with the 27,000 hectare Cerro Barco copper porphyry prospect, comprises the property under Joint Venture with B2Gold.
Diamond drilling was focused on wide spacing along one vein of the Pampa Paciencia system. Eight initial shallow diamond drill holes covered a large portion of the previously discovered 2.8 kilometre strike length with an average spacing of approximately 500 metres.
Highlights of the drill program were encountered in holes PP15-006 and PP15-007, intersecting 8.13 grams per tonne gold ("gpt" and "Au") and 29.09 gpt silver ("Ag") over 2.1 metres and 7.71 gpt Au and 46.58 gpt Ag over 3.75 metres, respectively. These drill holes undercut the area where Trench 1 reported intersections of 2.7 metres of 2.9 gpt Au and 43.00 apt Ag, including 0.6 metres of 5.58 gpt Au and 83.70 gpt Ag, spanning approximately 200 metres of high grade mineralization.
Trench 3 lies approximately 550 metres to the north-west and intersected 8.6 metres of 4.6 gpt Au and 99.30 gpt Ag (including 5 metres of 7.7 gpt Au and 162.20 gpt Ag), giving the high grade Paciencia zone a potential known strike length of 800 metres. The zone is open at depth and to the east.
Arena president and CEO William Randall said: "we are pleased with B2Gold’s discovery of high grade gold and silver mineralization within the Pampa Paciencia system, and encouraged that results to date have met B2Gold’s expectations. We look forward to reviewing the 2016 exploration program and hope for continued success in the New Year."
The gold bearing veins are associated with adularia, chalcedony, sulfosalts and crustiform-colloform textures typical of low sulfidation gold-silver bearing systems that are found elsewhere in northern Chile.
The geochemical signature of the gold bearing veins discovered to date at Paciencia exhibit a strong correlation of gold with Ag, Sb, Pb, Mo and lesser Cu, which is also common in other low sulfidation Au-Ag systems.
