Gold mineralisation discovered in Brazil

3rd July 2015

Australian-managed and ASX-listed minerals company Cleveland Mining Company announced, in March, the discovery of an extensive zone of primary gold mineralisation, less than 1.5 km south of its operational Premier Joint Venture gold mine, in central Brazil.

The discovery was the result of fieldwork within an area of anomalous gold-in-soil samples that was previously referred to by Cleveland Mining as the ‘Southern anomaly.’

Along with the outcropping mineralised rocks, the new prospect – named Vanuza – is defined by extensive gold-in-soil anomalism, together with coincident silver, copper, molybdenum, zinc, arsenic and cobalt soil anomalism, among other elements. This suggests a primary poly-metallic source.

A contour of gold anomalism measuring +20 ppb gold has been identified over an area extending over 2 km along strike up to the western tenement boundary and extending over 600 m in width. This makes the Vanuza anomaly about twice the size of the original anomaly around the Premier gold mine.

The position of Vanuza corresponds with a versatile time domain electromagnetic (VTEM) trend. VTEM is a geophysical method that maps rock conductivity as a result of conductive minerals, such as sulphides and graphite. These minerals are often associated with gold mineralisation, including that at the nearby Premier gold mine.

Prospect-scale geology mapping and sampling is currently in progress, having produced encouraging results to date, which is a noteable achievement considering the early stage of work.

Further, wide-spaced channel sampling has so far returned gold assays ranging from 0.1 g/t to 1.3 g/t gold. Of the 37 gold assays returned to date, all have shown a result of at least 0.1 g/t gold, suggesting extensive and pervasive gold mineralisation.

While these results do not represent economic gold grades, they are significant in the region as the tenor is similar to that found over the Premier gold mine, the company says, noting that multi-element assay results are pending.

Cleveland Mining states that primary mineralisation at the new prospect appears to be associated with laminated and brecciated quartz veining hosted in sheared, silicified graphitic and manganiferous schist, where the strati-graphy is cut by a north-west orientated regional structure.

Cleveland Mining MD David Mendelawitz says the extent of the mineralisation at Vanuza is “extremely encouraging” with all the early-stage indicators suggesting that it could be prospective for the discovery of a significant new deposit.

“While still at an early stage, we are excited about the apparent size and extent of Vanuza and highly encouraged by the results we have seen to date,” he says.

Mendelawitz adds that this is potentially a large gold system in a “world-class mineral province” that is known to host multimillion-ounce deposits – including the seven-million-ounce Serra Grande mine, which is located 2 km north-west of Vanuza, within a common structural corridor.

“In addition to the extensional drilling along strike of the current orebodies at Premier and O Capitão, Vanuza is now a high-priority exploration target for Cleveland.