Bell Copper Drills Strong Leached Cap in Porphyry at Big Sandy
January 5, 2022
News Release
Bell Copper Corporation
Bell Copper Drills Strong Leached Cap in Porphyry at Big Sandy
VANCOUVER, B.C. - Bell Copper Corporation (TSXV:BCU)(OTCQB:BCUFF)(“Bell Copper” or the “Company”) reports that it has drilled a strongly altered and veined hematitic leached capping hosted by quartz porphyry at its Big Sandy project. Big Sandy is a large, truncated porphyry copper-molybdenum target located in northwestern Arizona, approximately 30 kilometers south of the Company’s Perseverance Project.
Highlights
Drill is now cutting hematitic leached capping hosted by intensely sericitized quartz porphyry cut by quartz veinlets at an inclined depth of 1284 meters.
Leached capping began immediately beneath gravel at an inclined depth of 1192 meters with continuous, strong, seal-brown hematite vein fillings, quartz veinlets, hydrothermal breccia, and pervasive sericitic alteration in quartz porphyry.
Core drilling at BS-3 has resumed
Drilling and Analysis
Drillhole BS-3, which was oriented to test a 2400 meter by 2100 meter area of high electrical conductivity that was detected in an earlier magnetotelluric survey (refer to news release dated October 6, 2020), entered the mineralized quartz porphyry beginning at an inclined depth of 1192 meters, immediately beneath cemented gravel cover rocks. The true thickness of the gravel layers penetrated by BS-3 at an oblique angle is estimated to be 860 meters.
BS-3 encountered strongly altered and veined hematitic leached capping consisting of seal-brown-colored, earthy-textured hematite filling fractures and pervading the strongly sericitized groundmass of the quartz porphyry host rock. Stockwork-style to sheeted-style quartz veinlets and sericite-enveloped “D-veins” constitute a significant volume of the core, along with minor amounts of hydrothermal and structural breccia. To date, a 92-meter interval of this type of rock has been cut in BS-3, extending to the current bottom of the hole at a depth of 1284 meters. Drilling at BS-3 was suspended over the Christmas holiday and has now resumed.
Oriented core collected near the base of the gravel cover shows that at BS-3 the porphyry system is tilted about 45 degrees from its orientation before faulting. This tilt suggests that any supergene copper blanket that might underlie the hematitic leached capping in BS-3 can be targeted at shallower depth in the direction of drillhole BS-1, located 1200 meters to the east. A 2-meter interval of chalcocite supergene enrichment underlying hematitic leached capping was cut at a depth of 936 meters in BS-1, suggesting continuity of supergene leaching and porphyry-related alteration across a distance of 1200 meters. The intervening ground showed anomalously high electrical conductivity in the August 2020 magnetotelluric survey. A future drillhole is now contemplated to test that shallower target.
Pictures are representative of the 92 meters of leach capping drilled to date at BS-3
Tim Marsh, Bell’s President and CEO, and a Qualified Person as defined by NI43-101, said,
“BS-3 finished 2021 in a 90-meter interval of intensely hematitic, quartz-veined, sericitized quartz porphyry. It is exactly what we wanted to see as the first bedrock under gravel cover. All but the bottom 30 meters of the hole are now cased off and protected behind steel. We look forward to revealing what happens at the upcoming oxidation boundary, where any copper oxide and supergene copper sulfide minerals would tend to accumulate.”
About Bell Copper
Bell Copper is a mineral exploration company focused on the identification, exploration and discovery of large copper deposits located in Arizona. Bell Copper is exploring its 100% owned Big Sandy Porphyry Copper Project and the Perseverance Porphyry Copper Project which is under a Joint Venture - Earn In.
Qualified Person
The technical content of this release has been reviewed and approved by Timothy Marsh, PhD, PEng., the Company’s CEO and President. No mineral resource has yet been identified on the Big Sandy Project. There is no certainty that the present exploration effort will result in the identification of a mineral resource or that any mineral resource that might be discovered will prove to be economically recoverable.
On behalf of the Board of Directors of
Bell Copper Corporation
"Timothy Marsh"
Timothy Marsh, President, CEO & Director
For further information please contact the Company
Tel: 1 800 418 8250
Email: info@bellcopper.net
Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.
