The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Exploration is underway on a Snow Lake area mineral property that is garnering attention and investment from Hudbay. The first phase of exploration at the Freebeth Property began Oct. 3 with a surface geophysical survey totalling 90 kilometres. Earlier this year, Hudbay exercised its back-in option for Freebeth, owned by Toronto-based junior miner Rockcliff Resources. That requires Hudbay to pay $170,000 to Rockcliff, and incur at least $1.8 million in costs at Freebeth within three years, to earn a 55 per cent interest in the property. Rockcliff will hold a 45 per cent interest. Mobilization of drill equipment to the property was scheduled to start yesterday, with a total of 1,800 metres of drilling planned for the site. Drilling will test one anomaly identified from an airborne geophysical survey, three from a surface survey, and one stratigraphic target. Additional drilling has been budgeted in this first phase program if results warrant. 'We are very pleased to have Hudbay update us on its efforts at our Freebeth Property,' said Ken Lapierre, president and CEO of Rockcliff, in a news release. 'A large component of the program will focus on drill testing geophysical anomalies to determine their potential to host VMS (volcanogenic massive sulfide) mineralization. We look forward to the results of this first phase and additional programs moving forward.' Freebeth is part of Rockcliff's Snow Lake Project. It is located roughly 14 kilometres southeast of the Reed mine, co-owned by Hudbay, which is now in initial production. Freebeth hosts 'numerous untested geophysical targets, two known copper-bearing zones and excellent infrastructure,' according to Rockcliff. Hudbay can acquire an additional 10 per cent interest in Freebeth, for a total of 65 per cent, by bringing Freebeth into commercial production. In that scenario, Hudbay would also have to finance Rockcliff's 35 per cent portion of the development cost, with such costs reimbursed to Hudbay from the proceeds of production. As a company, Rockcliff describes its focus as being the discovery and advancement of mineral properties in the Snow Lake area. Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its regulation services provider accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of information supplied by Rockcliff.
