Projects

Mineral Mountain, Utah

Land and Status

In August 2009, we leased 120 unpatented mining claims (2,400 acres) from a local prospector. We have staked an additional 77 claims and the property now consists of 3,940 acres of unpatented mining claims on BLM land.

We recently completed a technical report on the property and are currently interviewing potential joint venture partners for further development.

Location and History

The Goldstrike property is located 30 northwest of St. George, Utah. Mineral Mountain is the most advanced part of the property with a small inferred resource.

The Goldstrike / Mineral Mountain project is located in a gold-bearing area 4 miles north-northwest of the Goldstrike mine. According to Willden and Adair (1986), the gold-bearing portion of the Goldstrike district extends for about 9 miles from Potters Peak (just south of Mineral Mountain) on the west to upper Tobin Wash on the east and for over 2 miles north-south.

Some gold was produced from the Goldstrike camp in the early 1900s (Butler and others, 1920), and at the time of Butler's visit there was some prospecting for arsenic and antimony in the area. No data on gold production from that era are available. Apparently there was no further significant activity in the district until exploration by Gold Resources, Inc. ("GRI") in 1975-76 (Willden and Adair, 1986). GRI was followed by Lustre Gold Mines Inc. in 1977, Occidental Minerals ("Occidental") in 1978-79, Houston International Minerals Company ("Houston International") in 1979-1982, Permian Exploration Account ("Permian") in, approximately, 1982-1986, and Inspiration Mines, Inc. in 1986 (Willden and Adair, 1986), with most of the activity apparently in and around the historic Goldstrike camp itself. A total of 69 holes were drilled by Occidental, Houston International, and Permian as of 1986 in the vicinity of the Goldstrike mine. According to Willden and Adair (1986), 17 of these holes drilled in five separate areas indicated "an aggregate ore reserve of about 1.17 million tons grading 0.064 oz/t in gold. In most of these holes, the ore is near the surface and a low stripping ratio can be expected." As a result a decision was made to mine this ore.

The Goldstrike Mine lies in about the center of this gold-bearing area. At the mine, a series of seven open pits, was eventually developed by Tenneco and subsequently by USMX from 1989 to 1996. The heap leach mine produced approximately a total of 280,000 ounces of gold from about 7.5 million tons of ore (Willden, 2000). It is now closed and has been reclaimed

Pegasus Gold Corp.. ("Pegasus") drilled the Mineral Mountain target area in 1989-1990, and Tenneco did follow-up drilling 1991-92. Although the total extent of either of their drilling programs is not known, a location map obtained from Mr. Ron Willden with at least some of the holes in the Mineral Mountain area shows about 69 drill hole locations. We have obtained assay information on 66 of these drill holes.

Midway Gold optioned the property in 2004 after the area was acquired by North Exploration. Midway drilled 8 RC holes before relinquishing the ground. We obtained the Midway Project Report (Hafen 2005), which contains assays and downhole geology.

Geology

The Goldstrike property lies in the eastern margin of the Basin and Range Province in the Bull Valley Mountains of southwestern Utah. Mineral Mountain, the most advanced part of the project, lies in a Tertiary volcanic field poured out upon deformed Paleozoic rocks and Eocene-Oligocene sediments.

A Miocene granite porphyry or rhyolite porphyry intrusion is centered at Mineral Mountain and intrudes Paleozoic sediments. Rocks as young as the Miocene have been displaced regionally by a series of east-west and northwest striking faults related to complex structural extension .

The main target mineralization at Mineral Mountain (and most of the rest of the property) is sediment-hosted gold in the Claron Formation. The Claron Formation consists of Eocene-Oligocene sedimentary rocks including sandstones, limestones, and conglomerates. The gold mineralization is localized by a NW bounding fault on the west. Additional exploration targets appear to be controlled by intrusive dikes and sills within the Claron Formation and in stratigraphic traps in the underlying carbonate rocks. There is also potential for disseminated gold in jasperoids at the Paleozoic/Tertiary contact.