Mining

Aston Minerals hits visible gold at recently acquired project in Canada

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By Robin Bromby - 
Aston Minerals ASX ASO interval coarse visible gold veinlets Edleston Project Ontario Canada

Aston’s maiden drilling campaign at Edleston has intersected coarse visible gold from 362m downhole.

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Nine months after a direction switch and four months after a name change, Aston Minerals (ASX: ASO) reports significant progress at its Edleston gold project in Ontario, Canada including intersecting coarse visible gold.

The company, formerly European Cobalt with projects in Slovakia and Finland, acquired Edleston in mid-2020, then changed its name in December to accommodate its new gold thrust.

Edleston is located near the gold centres of Timmins and Kirkland Lake and the project is within the Abitibi greenstone belt which, since its discovery in the early 1900s, has produced about 180 million ounces of gold.

Aston’s third drill hole struck the coarse visible gold as veinlets from 362m down hole.

The drilling intersected a broader 12m interval containing extensive quartz veining with pyrite-pyrrhotite and “occasionally visible gold”.

C$10 million already spent on exploration

Aston managing director Dale Ginn said hitting the visible gold veinlets 200m along strike to the east of the main Edleston mineralised body provides the company with a high degree of confidence regarding both the scale of the mineralisation and the methodology of targeting.

“The effective strike length tested by drilling consists of only 1km out of 10km of strike within the project,” he added.

The previous owner of the project spent C$10 million (A$10.25 million) on exploration.

This included 156 diamond drill holes.

At the time of acquiring the project, Aston noted that only 540m of a 3,300m-long corridor had been drill tested.

Cover has hindered mapping

The company at that time also noted the lack of outcrop at surface, and the depth of transported cover, had hindered geological mapping.

The current drilling program is based on geophysical data, with three diamond holes completed so far for 1,320m.

In all, Aston is planning 15 holes for 5,000m to extend and infill the Edleston Main mineralised trend.

It will test the along strike extension of the high-grade hanging wall target and then progress into regional targets.

At present, drilling is averaging 42m per shift.

Aston said the quartz veining in all three holes completed so far appears to correlate well with projected target intervals.