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First Cobalt reporting high-grade cobalt at Northern property

Company is undertaking muckpile sampling at property near Town of Cobalt in preparation for 2018 drill program
Northern Ontario Business Staff
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The former Keeley-Frontier mine, south of the town of Cobalt, is the focus of a reinvigorated exploration play in the famed silver mining camp by First Cobalt Corp.

First Cobalt Corp. is reporting high-grade cobalt values as high as 1.14 per cent from muckpile sampling at the historic Silver Banner Mine near the Town of Cobalt.

The company is doing the sampling at properties owned by partners First Cobalt, CobalTech and Cobalt One in advance of a 2018 winter drill program.

In a Nov. 8 news release, the company said the presence of cobalt “confirms the presence of a productive vein system in the underexplored mafic volcanic rocks, similar to that seen at the Bellellen, Keeley and Frontier mines.”

Highlights from veins in the grab samples include the following values: 

  • 1.14 per cent cobalt, 3 grams per tonne gold, and 0.17 per cent nickel;
  • 0.47 per cent cobalt, 738 grams per tonne gold, 0.02 per cent nickel, 0.13 per cent copper and 1.16 per cent lead; and
  • 0.69 per cent cobalt, 313 grams per tonne gold, 0.02 per cent nickel, 0.01 per cent copper, and 0.20 per cent lead.

“We have quickly identified several prospective cobalt targets within the First Cobalt, CobalTech and Cobalt One land packages and we are confident others will follow,” Trent Mell, First Cobalt’s president and CEO, said in a news release.

“As with Bellellen and Drummond, the positive results at Silver Banner make it an excellent candidate for additional work. The next task is to prioritize these targets for more focused exploration work and drilling through the winter months.”

The company said it would follow up with shallow drilling near historic workings to define mineralization further, and would test for mineral content of the vein, footwall and hanging wall rocks.

Silver Banner is currently owned by CobalTech Mining and is one of more than 50 historic mines being consolidated by First Cobalt in the Cobalt Camp through its the merger transactions with CobalTech and Cobalt One.