The Savant gold project is a drill ready project located 240km NW of Thunder Bay, Ontario, and which covers 229 square kilometres of underexplored but highly prospective stratigraphy for the discovery of both high-grade iron formation- and shear-hosted gold deposits.
Prospector Metals Corp. (TSX.V: PPP) currently has the option to earn-in to a 70% interest in the Savant gold project in return for a combination of annual cash and share payments to Capella plus staged work commitments of $C2,000,000 to be completed before November 15, 2024. An additional cash/share payment would be made to Capella in the event of a National Instrument 43-101 (“NI 43-101”) compliant mineral resource of greater than 1 million ounces of gold being reported. As at February 28, 2023, Prospector had completed expenditures of $C 905,000 at Savant (representing approximately 45% of the total expenditure required to earn-in to a 70% interest).
On August 15, 2022, Prospector announced that final assay results had been received for all 594 rock (grab1) samples taken at Savant during the summer 2022 field campaign. High-grade gold values were returned from two main structural corridors: i) a first-order deformation zone named the Wiggle Deformation Zone (and which passes through the previously recognized Wiggle Creek gold prospect) and ii) the newly-defined Snowbird-Shoal Deformation Zone (which passes through the Snowbird, Horseshoe, and Shoal prospects). Adjacent, undrilled fold hinges in iron-formation also represent high-priority targets for gold mineralization. A new LiDAR survey was also completed over the Savant gold project in June 2022, with data derived from this survey having now been processed and incorporated in to drill targeting.
Core drilling of priority targets at Savant is currently expected to begin during H2 2023.
Project Snapshot
| Location | 240 km NW of Thunder Bay, Ontario |
| Ownership | 100% Capella Minerals Ltd. Prospector Metals Corp. Earn-In to 70%. 2% NSR to underlying vendors, 1% may be acquired for CAD 1M |
| Status | Exploration stage, drill ready |
| Deposit types | Primary targets are high-grade, iron formation- and shear-hosted gold Secondary targets are base metal-rich VMS deposits |
| Property Size | 22,900 hectares (229 square kilometres) |
| Host Rocks | Warclub (iron formation) and Jutten assemblages for Au targets Handy Lake and Jutten assemblages for VMS targets |
| Age | Precambrian |
| Main Economic Elements | Gold (Au) & base metals (Cu-Zn) |
| Access | All weather road and within 25km of CNR main rail line |
Other significant iron formation-hosted gold deposits in the broader Savant district include Newmont’s Musselwhite mine and Equinox Gold/Orion Mine Finance’s Greenstone deposit. Kinross Gold’s (formerly Great Bear’s) recent Dixie discovery is located in the nearby Red Lake district (Figure 1).
Location Map
District-Scale Geology and Key Target Areas
The Savant gold project is located within the Archean-age Savant Lake-Sturgeon Lake greenstone belt. The Company’s large mineral claim block covers an underexplored but highly prospective stratigraphy for the discovery of high-grade, iron formation-hosted (“Musselwhite-type”) gold deposits and shear-hosted gold deposits (Figure 3). Secondary targets including base metal-rich VMS deposits in the flanking Handy Lake and Jutten volcano-sedimentary sequences.
Terms of the Prospector JV Agreement
On September 16, 2021, the Company agreed to revise the original (September 21, 2020) terms of Prospector’s earn-In to a 70% interest in the Savant Lake property in order to accommodate delays in accessing parts of the project area. The revised terms of the agreement are as follows:
| Cash CAD | PPP Shares | Work Commitment | Status | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| On-signing | $50,000 | 666,666 | - | Completed |
| September 20, 2021 | - | 333,333 | - | Completed |
| November 15, 2022 | $50,000 | 666, 666 | $500,000 | Completed |
| November 15, 2023 | $50,000 | 666,666 | $1,000,000 | Pending |
| November 15, 2024 | $50,000 | 333,333 | $500,000 | Pending |
| Total | $200,000 | 2,666,666 | $2,000,000 |
In the event of a Canadian National Instrument 43-101 compliant mineral resource of >1 million ounces of gold being defined on the property, Prospector will make a further payment to Capella of $50,000 in cash and 666,666 Prospector shares.
Work Completed under the Prospector JV and H2 2022 / 2023 Work Program
Prospector completed a high-resolution, 4,000-line km helicopter-borne magnetic survey over the main Savant claim block in late 2020. This survey provided higher definition of the principal gold targets at Savant, including the estimated 60 km cumulative strike length of deformed iron formation units (with 90% of this strike length having either limited or no surface exposure). Detailed evaluation / interpretation of this airborne magnetic data has been completed, with results having been integrated with existing geological, geochemical, and geophysical data.
On August 15, 2022, Prospector announced that final assay results had been received for all 594 grab1 samples taken as part of the May/June 2022 field campaign at Savant. Results included:
- Prospector reported high-grade gold assays (up to 68 grams per tonne, or “g/t Au”) from samples taken from a significant, first-order deformation zone named the Wiggle Deformation Zone (“WDZ”). The previously-recognized Wiggle Creek prospect lies within the WDZ, and currently contains at least 1.3km strike of known gold-bearing structure and remains open in all directions.
- Prospector also identified a second, previously-unrecognized structural corridor (the Snowbird-Shoal Deformation Zone; “SSDZ”), which hosts numerous high-grade gold occurrences including Snowbird and Horseshoe. New sampling from around the Snowbird and Horseshoe occurrences included two samples containing 99.6 g/t Au and 60 g/t Au.
In addition, a new LiDAR survey had been undertaken over Savant in June 2022, with interpretation of the data derived from this survey currently in progress.
The WDZ represents a previously unrecognized gold-bearing structural setting that shares many similarities with the Pyke Fault, which is the host shear zone for the Meliadine gold deposits located in Nunavut. Core drilling of priority gold targets is currently expected to begin in mid 2023.
1 Grab samples are select samples and not necessarily representative of gold mineralization on the Savant property.