Viva Gold Corp., a Vancouver, Canada-headquartered company, received approval to drill 20 holes at the Tonopah gold project, according to the news release that was put out by the company.
A reverse circulation drill rig was recently brought to the site to commence drilling, according to the release. The Tonopah gold project is on the Walker Lane trend in western Nevada.
“Viva’s goal at the Tonopah project, aided by a reduced royalty structure, is to expand its core zone of pit-constrained mineral resource by testing open extensions to the gold mineralization in areas suggested by historic reconnaissance drilling and extensive geophysical survey,” said James Hesketh, president and CEO of Viva Gold Corp.
The principal focus of the current drill program is to confirm and extend gold mineralization in the Midway Hills area of the Tonopah project and on the highly prospective trend of over one kilometer in length between the Midway Hills and the core Tonopah resource area, Hesketh said.
The second focus of the program is to test extensions to the south and east of the current Tonopah resource area along the eastern flank of the underlying Palmetto argillite formation.
“We have strong evidence that leads us to believe that the Tonopah project has the potential to be significantly increased in size,” Hesketh said.
According to Viva’s July 16 news release, the Tonopah project includes a strong zone of near surface, pit-constrained gold resource containing 253,000 ounces of measured and indicated gold resource.
This resource was also drilled by a prior operator who had the original goal of developing a small, near-surface underground mine.
In developing Viva’s resource estimate, the 2019 block model for the Tonopah project was extended to the northwest to incorporate historic drilling in the Midway Hills area. This extension developed new blocks of mineralized material containing approximately 25-30 thousand gold ounces, which is not currently included in the pit-constrained mineral resource estimate, according to the news release.
Drilling has demonstrated that gold mineralization at Tonopah has a strong correlation to the faulted perimeter of the Palmetto argillite formation.
Mineralization at the Tonopah project has been identified in a series of north-striking extensional structural zones within an overall mineralized trend along the northwest Walker Lane trend.
Viva Gold is a gold exploration and development company with a focus on Nevada. Viva holds 100 percent of the Tonopah Gold Project on the Walker Lane Trend in Nevada, southeast of the Round Mountain gold mine.