Ascot Resources hits 488g/t gold at Big Missouri gold-silver deposit
Vancouver-based Ascot Resources (TSX: AOT) has drilled its highest-grade gold intercept in five years – unveiling a 1m interval at 488 grams per tonne gold at its Big Missouri deposit.
This was within a broader 7.9m intersection grading 62.76g/t gold and 27.36gt silver, which was one of numerous successful holes in the latest drill program at the deposit.
Big Missouri is part of Ascot’s Premier gold project, which is located in Canada’s British Columbia province on Nisga’a Nation treaty lands.
Drilling for the 2022 exploration season was completed by October – totalling 50 holes for 4,752m.
Drilling returns 20 assays over 10g/t gold
The drilling program was targeting gold mineralization at the A Zone and the Unicorn Area of the Big Missouri deposit around the old S-1 open pit.
Of the 50 holes, 20 have so far returned assays greater than 10g/t gold.
In this latest batch of 18 results, highlight intercepts were 3m at 30.98g/t gold and 9.35g/t silver, including 1m at 90.7g/t gold and 19.75g/t silver.
Another hole returned 14.5m at 6.75g/t and 12.44g/t silver.
President and chief executive officer Derek White said the headline intercept of 488g/t gold is the highest-grade interval Ascot has drilled since 2017, and the fourth highest assay ever recorded at Big Missouri.
“The Big Missouri project continues to impress with more bonanza grade gold and additional occurrences of coarse visible gold,” he added.
Mr White said there was strengthening confidence that there is more gold to be discovered outside the existing resource model.
Once the biggest gold mine in North America
Still to come are results from 12 holes drilled from underground at Big Missouri, four surface holes near the S-1 pit as 12 holes drilled on the western side of the Big Missouri ridge.
The Premier gold mine, after which Ascot’s project is named, began production in 1918 and, until it closed in 1952, was the largest gold mine in North America.
Big Missouri came into production in 1938 and closed in 1941 due to wartime pressures.