Omai Gold Mines will continue drilling at its Region Seven (Cuyuni-Mazaruni) location from next week since it believes that even more deposits of gold are available at the Wenot deposit.
Omai’s Wenot pit in Region 7
The company recently filed a technical report with SEDAR, which supports the 16.7 million tonnes of indicated gold and 19.5 million tonnes of inferred gold it had announced the Wenot deposit held last month.
In this technical report, consultant P&E Mining explained that extending the Wenot deposit is expected to cost US$2.65 million and be completed in the next 12 months. According to the report, it was explained that exploring these targets could provide opportunities for open-pit mining.
“Some of these targets are drill ready, but others would benefit from further fieldwork, including mapping with focused mechanical trenching and sampling or geophysical surveys with lithostructural interpretation… target areas for significant follow-up trenching and sampling include Broccoli Hill, Snake Pond, Blueberry Hill, and Fennell West,” the report states.
The consultant recommended the expansion of the Wenot deposit, by using compiled historical data and identified drill targets to guide exploration efforts. It was explained that some of this work is expected to be part of the Phase 1 drilling in 2022. Oher parts are expected to extend into the Phase 2 programme.
In January, Omai Gold Mines had announced the discovery of significant gold values during initial trenching and drilling on the Broccoli Hill target at its Region Seven (Cuyuni-Mazaruni), Guyana property.
The company had disclosed that trenching exposed a quartz-rich shear zone with samples assaying 29.3 g/t Au, 7.8 g/t Au, 5.0 g/t Au and 2.2 g/t Au along a 40-meter strike. Additionally, the first round of drilling on Broccoli Hill, totalling 690 metres, intersected gold mineralisation with four of the six holes returning assays greater than 1 g/t Au and as high as 4.04 g/t Au over 0.9 m and 0.91 g/t over 6.8 m.
According to Omai’s Chief Executive Officer, Elaine Ellingham, “…our initial trenching and drilling on Broccoli Hill, that commenced late in 2021, has already resulted in several significant gold values.”
To this end, the CEO had said that over the next couple of months, they will advance some of the property’s prime exploration targets, including Broccoli Hill, that holds potential for new near-surface mineralisation amenable to open-pit mining.
Last year, Omai had announced its impending move to the Fennel pit, having concluded its drilling programme under the old Wenot mine. When it comes to the Fennell pit, the company had also said it would start its drill programme there in the second quarter of 2022. It was explained that previous explorations by gold company Iamgold at the pit in 2007 established Fennell as a primary target on Omai.
“This drilling identified a significant gold deposit beneath the past-producing pit. The Fennell pit produced 2.4 million ounces between 1993 and 2004. It was mined to a depth of 250m where it bottomed at a barren diabase sill. After production ceased, Iamgold completed the exploration beneath the sill and completed a resource report.”
“This drilling reached a maximum depth of about 960 metres with the deepest holes ending in mineralisation, suggesting even further depth potential. Omai has started modelling this historic data and plans to initiate a drill programme on the Fennell target in Q2 of next year. This work will require deeper holes to verify the historic resource and to explore the depth extent of this mineralisation,” Omai had explained.
Omai Gold Mines, which returned to the Wenot and Fennell pits at the Region Seven (Cuyuni-Mazaruni) site in 2020 after leaving Guyana in 2015, had announced in December 2020 that it would be pressing forward with the 5000-metre drilling programme.
