ICN RESOURCES LTD.: ENCOURAGING PHASE I RESULTS FROM HOG RANCH PROJECT
ICN Resources Ltd. has released the results of its phase I drill program at its wholly owned Hog Ranch project, located in northwestern Nevada. In late December, 2009, ICN completed 2,856 metres (9,370 feet) of drilling in 13 reverse circulation (RC) holes and 1,427.1 metres (4,682 feet) in five core holes, for a total of 4,283.1 metres (14,052 feet) in 18 drill holes. The phase I program was designed to test for steeply dipping, high-grade gold feeder structures lying beneath and around previously mined open pits. Potential structural trends, defined by 3-D analysis of historical drill data, were the focus of most of the drilling completed during this phase I program. Areas of high-grade mineralization such as that encountered in drill hole 8-199, which intercepted 194.1 grams per tonne gold over 1.5 metres beneath the historic 139 pit, were the types of targets tested.
The most significant results from the current program come from hole HR09-11, also drilled beneath the historic 139 pit. This hole intercepted 1.5 metres of 7.4 grams per tonne gold (8.0 grams per tonne metallic screen check assay) and 2.1 metres of 9.3 grams per tonne gold (9.4 grams per tonne metallic screen check assay). All drill results are shown in the attached table. While these moderate-grade intercepts do not match the typical high-grade intercepts from the historic drilling (generally greater than 15 grams per tonne to 50 grams per tonne gold), they add substantial new information which is useful as ICN continues to better understand the geometry and continuity of the historic high-grade intervals. These encouraging results beneath the 139 pit require further follow-up especially because a very high-grade vein/breccia, from which a sample is shown on the ICN website, was mined at the bottom of the 139 pit.
Additionally, many of the drill holes intercepted long, low-grade intervals, suggesting not only their proximity to possible high-grade feeder structures, but also the potential to identify additional areas of large-tonnage, lower-grade mineralization on the property. For example, drill hole HR09-17, located to the northeast of the historic Geib pit, returned 67.1 metres of 0.61 gram per tonne gold and drill holes HR09-12 and HR09-16 intercepted 16.8 metres of 0.99 gram per tonne gold and 16.8 metres of 0.92 gram per tonne gold, respectively, along the margins of the historic Krista pit. The HR09-17 intercept is particularly significant as it occurs in a broad zone of quartz-pyrite stockwork veining and a coincident CSAMT anomaly which surrounds the interpreted Geib fault zone. This fault may control mineralization in some of the larger historically mined pits, and forms a highly prospective, new target for both near-surface low-grade mineralization and higher-grade structurally controlled mineralization. Long intervals of low-grade gold were also found in other drill holes as shown in the attached table.
DRILL HOLE RESULTS SUMMARY
Interval Grade
Hole ID From (m) to (m) (m) (g/t Au) Area Drill Type
HR09-01 21.3 24.4 3.0 0.89 139 RC
48.8 96.0 47.2 0.32 " "
Incl. 48.8 53.3 4.6 0.97 " "
HR09-02 No significant results 139 RC
HR09-03 86.9 126.5 39.6 0.23 Geib RC
HR09-04 125.4 173.3 47.8 0.35 Geib Core
HR09-05 No significant results Geib RC
HR09-06 3.2 34.4 31.2 0.22 S. Krista Core
HR09-07 96.0 143.3 47.3 0.22 S. Krista RC
HR09-08 73.2 77.7 4.6 0.59 Crater Zone RC
91.4 99.1 7.6 0.62 " "
HR09-09 11.9 46.9 35.1 0.48 Flat - NW Geib Core
HR09-10 56.4 86.9 30.5 0.23 NE Krista RC
HR09-11 22.5 24.0 1.5 7.40 139 Core
47.6 48.7 1.1 4.13 " "
176.3 178.4 2.1 9.30 " "
HR09-12 82.3 106.7 24.4 0.51 N. Krista RC
135.6 152.4 16.8 0.99 " "
incl. 146.3 152.4 6.1 2.04 " "
205.7 243.8 38.1 0.37
HR09-13 54.9 131.1 76.2 0.30 N. Krista RC
HR09-14 71.6 112.8 41.2 0.40 S. Krista RC
incl. 103.6 108.2 4.6 1.00 " "
HR09-15 182.7 199.5 16.8 0.37 N. Krista Core
HR09-16 0.0 29.0 29.0 0.27 S. Krista RC
41.2 57.9 16.8 0.92
incl. 48.8 57.9 9.1 1.35
HR09-17 24.4 91.4 67.1 0.61 Geib Fault RC
incl. 51.8 54.9 3.0 1.83
HR09-18 54.9 74.7 19.8 0.23 Canyon Zone RC
True widths have not been determined.
Two drill holes also targeted areas distal to the historic open pits, in areas of sparse historic drilling, and both of these holes returned encouraging results. HR09-08 was drilled to the east of the Geib pit, in an area of phreatomagmatic explosion craters defining linear trends, potentially related to significant structures. Drill hole HR09-18 was drilled in an area referred to as the Canyon zone. Both drill holes intercepted anomalous gold values in extensive areas of clay-silica alteration, indicating new potential in these areas of limited historic drilling.
Planned drilling beneath the Bell Springs pit, located two miles to the south, and testing in two of the historic unmined deposit areas, the Airport and Cameco zones, where an historic drill hole encountered 61.8 grams per tonne gold over 6.1 metres at a downhole depth of 50.3 metres, was not completed owing to inclement weather in late December. Further work will be planned in these and other areas after analysis of the information obtained from this phase I program.
ICN is currently conducting further geological modelling of the drilling results, and will be completing a clay mineral zonation study based on use of a Terraspec analytical spectral device. The Terraspec data, along with patterns of anomalous arsenic-antimony-mercury-silver and other pathfinder elements that are apparent in ICN's drilling results and previous geophysical (CSAMT) data, will be further used to aid in future drill targeting to identify higher-grade feeder areas and potential zones for bulk mining. The company plans a phase II program later in 2010 to test other prospective areas such as the Airport, Cameco (discovered after original mine closure) and Bell Springs targets once further data acquisition and evaluation are completed. A new evaluation of the potential of lower-grade targets will also be conducted given the encouraging results from this current drilling program.
The technical information in this news release was reviewed by Dr. D. Baker, PhD, PGeo, a qualified person as defined by NI-43-101, and president of Equity Exploration Consultants Ltd., the project manager for the 2009 Hog Ranch program.
ICN implemented industry-standard quality assurance/quality control protocols including insertion of standard, blank and duplicate samples. ALS Laboratory Group (an ISO 17025-accredited laboratory) prepared and analysed the Hog Ranch samples at its Reno, Nev., analytical facility.
