IMPACT Silver Corp. ("IMPACT") is pleased to announce the discovery of significant gold and copper mineralization in the Southwest Sector of the 124 km2 Royal Mines of Zacualpan Silver Project.
IMPACT crews began prospecting in the Southwest Sector in mid-2006 and found many new vein systems. In recent months sampling crews have been opening, clearing and sampling some of the old mine workings in the sector. The first results received are from the Pecheco Vein System where significant assays were found in two historic mine workings.
PECHECO PROSPECT
The Pecheco Prospect is located 5 km southwest of the Zacualpan processing plant. It is marked by a cluster of old mine adits and shafts, most of which are collapsed or blocked. Sampling at the end of one short adit recently opened by IMPACT field workers returned the following values near the end of the adit:
|
PECHECO ADIT SAMPLES |
|||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
LOCATION |
ESTIMATED |
GOLD |
COPPER |
SILVER |
GOLD EQUIVALENT |
|
TRUE WIDTH (m) |
(g/t) |
(%) |
(g/t) |
(g/t) |
|
|
End of adit |
2.7 |
14.6 |
0.46 |
58 |
17.0 |
|
Including: |
1.2 |
32.4 |
0.80 |
106 |
36.8 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
8 m from end of adit |
2.4 |
5.9 |
0.70 |
80 |
9.4 |
|
Including: |
0.9 |
10.9 |
1.27 |
134 |
17.1 |
COBRE PROSPECT
The Cobre Prospect is an adit located on the Pecheco Vein System 3.5 km southeast of the Pecheco Prospect. Samples were collected in five places over the 25 m exposed length of the vein in the adit and returned the following values:
|
COBRE ADIT SAMPLES |
|||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
LOCATION |
ESTIMATED |
GOLD |
COPPER |
SILVER |
GOLD EQUIVALENT |
|
TRUE WIDTH (m) |
(g/t) |
(%) |
(g/t) |
(g/t) |
|
|
Average of 5 samples along 25 m exposed length of vein |
1.0 |
1.2 |
2.34 |
181 |
11.3 |
|
including: |
0.7 |
7.0 |
0.47 |
475 |
18.1 |
|
and including |
1.2 |
0.2 |
7.81 |
88 |
23.4 |
COPPER AND GOLD EXPLORATION MODEL
IMPACT geologists have been working on an exploration model that suggests there may be a gold and copper district lying underneath the silver district at the Royal Mines of Zacualpan. Historically Zacualpan has been a silver district with secondary zinc and lead mineralization. However, small pockets of copper mineralization have been observed in the deeper levels of some of the mines for many years. The gold and copper mineralization reported in this news release was found in deeply eroded river valleys at lower elevations than the silver mineralization found elsewhere in the Southwest Sector of the district. These observations generated a model which theorizes that gold and copper mineralization may lie at depth below the silver, zinc and lead mineralization of the district.
In order to further test this model, IMPACT geologists examined the Alacran Mine in the southern part of the district. Alacran is one of the deepest former producers in the district with workings extending to depths of over 300 m. Although the mine was closed and allowed to flood several years ago, several large blocks of mineralization extracted from deep levels in the mine were left in a surface dump. IMPACT geologists took a random sample of this pyretic vein material from the dump which assayed 7.03g/t gold, 0.54% copper and 74g/t silver, giving further weight to this new exploration model.
IMPACT is continuing to explore both silver and deep gold-copper targets at the Royal Mines of Zacualpan Project. Field crews are sampling old mine workings found at lower elevations in the Southwest Sector and other target areas elsewhere on the large property. Later, after the planned 2007 program of drilling silver targets is complete, IMPACT plans to test a number of deep gold and copper targets.
Although there is a lot of exploration work yet to be done to determine the extent and economic viability of the gold and copper mineralization at Zacualpan, the results reported in this news release demonstrate that at least two parts of the silver district have gold and copper mineralization at depth. If exploration leads to outlining of economic quantities of gold and copper mineralization, it will complement the silver production from the district and will bring a multi element mix to the production profile.
George Gorzynski, P.Eng. and Nigel Hulme, P.Geo., Qualified Persons under the meaning of Canadian National Instrument 43-101, are responsible for the technical content of this news release. Chip and channel samples were collected from cleaned rock faces in old mine workings and from bedrock outcrops over a continuous representative interval using a moil and hammer, bagged, sealed and then securely stored at the IMPACT base camp until shipment. A total of 5% assay standards and blanks were inserted into every sample shipment as a quality control measure. All samples were shipped to the ALS Chemex preparation laboratory in Guadalajara (Mexico) where they were fine crushed (70% passing a 2mm screen), pulverized (85% passing a 75 micron screen) and a pulp split separated for assay by a riffle splitter. These pulps were shipped to the ALS Chemex laboratory in North Vancouver, Canada, where a 30-gram split of each was assayed for gold and silver by standard fire assay and a 10-gram split was analyzed for an additional 30 elements by ICP spectrometry. Samples high in zinc, lead or copper were then wet assayed to determine their values.
IMPACT Silver Corp. is a silver focused mining and exploration company with a producing silver operation at Zacualpan (Mexico), a new project with an operating processing plant at Zacatecas (Mexico) and other projects in the Dominican Republic. Energold Drilling Corp. (EGD:TSX.V) owns 6.6 million shares of IMPACT.
On behalf of the Directors of IMPACT Silver Corp.
"Frederick W. Davidson"
President & CEO
For further information please contact:
Darrell Rader, Corporate Development
Telephone: 604-681-9501
The TSX Venture Exchange does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this news release.
