Coast Copper releases assay results from Empire mine property

Coast Copper (TSX-V: COCO) has intersected high grade copper and gold at its Raven Bluff and Raven pit targets, 200 metres north of the past-producing Merry Widow open pit mine at the Empire mine project on Vancouver Island. 

The 15,764-hectare Empire mine project hosts three past-producing open pit mines — Merry Widow, Kingfisher pit 1 and 2— and two past-producing underground mines — Benson Lake and Merry Widow/Kingfisher underground — that yielded iron, copper, gold and silver. 

Highlights from two drillholes and one partial drillhole, included 16.28 metres grading 7.18 grams gold per tonne, 3.17% copper, 47.8 grams silver per tonne, 0.056% cobalt starting at 97.78 metres in drill hole MW21-015 at the Raven Bluff target; and 1.67 metres grading 6.20 grams per gold, 0.002% copper, 0.4 grams silver per tonne starting at 31 metres in hole MW21-017 at the Raven pit target.  

MW21-017 is the first ever drillhole to be drilled under the backfilled Raven pit. As a magnetite resource, the Raven deposit’s sulphide content made it uneconomic in the past, as such, the deposit was abandoned and later backfilled with waste rock from the Merry Widow pit, the company said.  

After passing through 30 metres of waste dump material, the drill immediately cored into semi-massive pyrrhotite and chalcopyrite. The company notes that deeper in the hole, it encountered other bands of massive magnetite of up to 8.6 metres.