Lake Shore reports glittering results from Thunder Creek

TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – Shares in TSX-listed Lake Shore Gold leapt 18,9% on Wednesday, after it reported some stellar drilling results from its Thunder Creek joint-venture property, located next to the company's Timmins mine, in Ontario, Canada.

Lake Shore owns 60% of the Thunder Creek joint venture, and is the operator, while West Timmins Mining holds the balance.

The results include wedge Hole TC09-68b, which intersected the best widths and grades encountered to date at Thunder Creek, the company reported.

TC09-68b intercepted 12,75 g/t gold over 83,40 m, or 13,73 g/t over 77,50 m, including 24,68 g/t over 13 m, 38,22 g/t over 11 m and 26,78 g/t over 8,50 m.

TC09-68b is located approximately 50 m above a previously released wedge, Hole TC09-68a, which included an intercept of 10,09 g/t gold over 4,70 m, including 17,16 g/t over 2,25 m.

"The widths and grades of the intercepts reported from wedge Hole TC09-68b are clearly our most encouraging to date and demonstrate that we are dealing with a large gold system,” said Lake Shore CEO Tony Makuch.

“The results highlight the potential of Thunder Creek to host a significant orebody with multiple horizons covering different geological settings,” he said.

The company currently has four drills operating on the property, and has added a drill at the Timmins mine property to look for new mineralization along the north-east extension of the same geological contact hosting the Rusk zone, Makuch said.

The results published on Wednesday also include hole TC09-72, an infill hole designed to test for the upper limits of the Rusk and Porphyry zones, and which has confirmed the down-dip extension of the Porphyry zone.

The company also released results for Holes TC08-63, TC08-65, TC08-66, TC08-67 and TC09-71.

LSE-listed Hochschild Mining opwns 40% of Lake Shore, and CEO Miguel Aramburú said on Wednesday that the company was “delighted” with the encouraging drill results.

“Lake Shore Gold is a long term strategic asset for Hochschild and we remain extremely confident about the company's prospects,” he said.

“We are working closely with their management team to continue to explore the full potential of their assets."

Lake Shore started processing development ore from its Timmins mine, in Ontario, at the company's Bell Creek mill in March this year. It is targetting production of 30 000 oz of gold for 2009.

Shares in the firm rose C$0,46 on Wednesday, to C$2,90 apiece by 15:59 in Toronto.

West Timmings Mining surged 56,89%, to C$1,60 a share.