Second time’s the charm?

New technologies and exploration techniques are revealing hidden secrets in areas that have had lots of mining activity

The Eholt area is just north of the old Phoenix Mine by the community of Grand Forks. — courtesy Jim Kermeen.

A mining company has begun exploration work in the B.C. Interior with the hopes of replicating the success of the Phoenix Mine, which produced one million ounces of gold over its operational lifespan.

Open Gold Corp., based in Vancouver, has begun re-exploration work on the Eholt Property, a block of land a few kilometres north of the old Phoenix Mine.

Company geologists and contractors are using newer technologies and techniques to try and sniff out elusive gold and gold/copper deposits, said Jim Kermeen, a geologist and former manager of the Phoenix Mine.

Although the mine ended production in 1978, new magnetic and electromagnetic airborne surveys and knowledge of geological structures have identified six areas worthy of re-exploration.

"It's possible we'll find deposits that are only gold or we'll find copper/gold deposits like there was with Phoenix," Kermeen said, "so those are the main elements we are looking for."

Programs have wrapped up in the Dead Honda and Senator zones of the property and preparations are ongoing to start work on the Seattle section—an area difficult to access because it lies on the Trans Canada Trail.

The Seattle zone has indications of mineralization present in other geological deposits like the ones the company is looking for, but some of the original drill work wasn't effectively done, he said.

"There's been some drilling there in the past and surface workings but there's numerous parts of it that have not been properly tested," Kermeen said. "We intend to go back in and do that."

To date, Open Gold has done roughly 1,700 metres of drill work in the Eholt Property, which is in a geological district that stretches from the Boundary region into northern Washington State.