Motherlode Project, Copper Gold, Philippines
The Motherlode Copper Gold- project covers an area of 878 ha and is located 12 km south of Surigao City, the capital city in the province of Surigao del Norte, Philippines. Motherlode, formerly known as “The Mindanao Motherlode Mine” (“Motherlode”) was an epithermal vein style bonanza-grade gold mine that is estimated to have produced and estimated 500,000 ounces of gold from 1937 through to 1953*. Motherlode, which was once one of the Philippines’ highest grade gold producers, is located in the center of the Project’s tenements. On the basis of past drilling, Motherlode has excellent potential for both epithermal vein-style gold and deeper copper-gold porphyry mineralisation.
The Motherlode is situated within a 15 km radius of multi-million ounce gold and gold/copper porphyry deposits and mines, which include Philex Mining Corporation’s Boyongan and Bayugo gold/copper porphyry deposits, and Manila Mining Corporation’s former gold/copper mines.
Past drilling conducted on the Motherlode targeted the epithermal vein system, returning significant results including 15.5m at 5.92g/t gold and 3.9m at 18.11g/t gold. Old workings extend to depths of +400 meters below surface.
Rugby conducted a limited drilling program in 2011 on secondary targets, which surrounded the prime Motherlode target area which at the time remained under application. The drilling results, together with earlier geophysical surveying anomalies strongly vectored epithermal gold and porphyry copper-gold potential to the main Motherlode area.
Rugby commenced drilling both extensions to the epithermal vein system and a deeper porphyry target indicated by a significant two kilometer Induced Polarisation anomaly. Rugby’s MD009 intersected 584m of porphyry mineralization from immediately below the mine workings at 343 m to the hole bottom at 928 m. The grade was 0.62 g/t gold equivalent (see table below). The intercept included a wide zone of diorite porphyry and argillically altered tuff averaging 0.3 g/t gold, 0.3% copper and 64 g/t molybdenum. Copper and molybdenum values increased with depth coinciding with higher IP chargeabilities. The Company is encouraged by this early drilling, as the very large porphyry target was validated.
Our geophysical experts have suggested that it is very difficult to discern the better targets within this broad, deep IP 2 km long target. Magneto Tellurics (MT) may be better able to define the better targets at depth. MT has been unavailable due to inability to import equipment and operators into the country since the commencement of COVID-19 restrictions from early 2020.
*This historical estimate is presented for reference purposes only. A majority of the records on actual ore produced at Motherlode were destroyed during WW2 and by later fires. Management has examined physical evidence at the site and available geological data to confirm that the estimation is suitable for presentation.
**The Company will be required to carry out a further assessment of previous exploration results, including drilling, conducted by the previous operator. The Company believes the data are suitable to report in this news release for informational reference only.
Paul Joyce, COO and a “qualified person” within the definition of that term in NI 43-101, has supervised the preparation of the technical information contained on this presentation. Some of the information presented is historical in nature and the Company will be required to do further assessment of this data. Certain information contained herein can be considered forward looking. Read the Cautionary Statement.