Commencement of Trenching & D

RNS Number : 7987Q

Condor Resources PLC

10 August 2010

 

10^th August 2010

Condor Resources Plc

(''Condor'' or ''the Company'')

Commencement of Trenching & Drilling Programme on La India Project in Nicaragua

Condor (AIM: CNR), the Central American gold exploration company, is pleased to announce that a trench and drill sampling programme is underway on Condor's El Rodeo Concession in La India Gold District of Nicaragua.

Condor announced on 14 January 2010 the grant of the El Rodeo Concession, a 100% owned concession which covers an area of over 60 square kilometres in La India Mining District.

The programme is designed to define the width and grade of a gold mineralised structure, known as the Andrea Vein at approximately 100 metre intervals, along a 2 kilometre strike length identified through rock chip and soil sampling undertaken by the previous concession holder, Radius Gold, a Canadian exploration company. This previous rockchip sampling had returned numerous samples over 1 g/t, including assay results of up to 25g/t gold.

The steeply-dipping Andrea Vein runs along an incised valley, in places exposed as a rockface on the bank of a creek and elsewhere, as isolated outcrops in the steep valley slopes above the creek. Trench sampling is being undertaken where topography allows excavation to expose the vein and wallrock in cross-section. Sampling with a hand-held circular rock-saw ensures a consistent and representative width to the samples, which are taken at geologically determined sample lengths averaging approximately 1 metre.

Where the Andrea Vein, or preferably, the hanging wall to the Andrea Vein is exposed in a near vertical rockface then trench sampling is not practical. In these locations sampling is being undertaken using a pneumatic pusher-leg rock drill. This drill, which is designed to drill blast holes in underground mines, is capable of drilling up to 10 metres into the rockface using a 20 millimetre drill bit and is small enough to be easily transported to poorly accessible locations. The drilling produces pulverised rock samples which are collected at the drillhole collar. Approximately three kilograms of sample is collected from every metre drilled with complete sample recovery achieved and contamination between samples avoided by removing the drill bit and drill string from the hole between samples and cleaning out any remaining sample material using compressed air through a tube inserted into the hole.

Four trenches of approximately 10 metres length have already been excavated over a 400 metre strike length at the northwestern end of the vein, with more trenches planned. Four drillholes have been completed, also at the northwestern end of the vein, testing a further 100 metre strike length, with the drillholes penetrating between 4 metres and almost 10 metres into the rock face. The programme is expected to continue throughout August and the samples will then be assayed at BSI Inspectorate's certified laboratories in the USA. Results should be announced in early October.

Gold mineralisation in La India Gold Mining District is epithermal and past mining and exploration activity undertaken in the vicinity of the historic La India Mine suggests that the high grade ore zone is located between approximately 200 metres and 500 metres altitude. The surface expression of the Andrea Vein in the current trench and drilling programme lies between 550 metres in the southeast and 700 metres altitude in the northwest. The abundance of finely banded chalcedonic quartz and bladed textures are all typical of the top of the ore zone in an epithermal system and it is expected that higher grades and wider gold intersections will be encountered below surface. The trenching and drilling results will be used to help identify targets for a deeper drilling programme using conventional diamond core or reverse circulation drilling techniques.

Detailed mapping undertaken in conjunction with the trenching and drilling programme has identified a number of shallow artisinal mine workings on both the Andrea Vein and also exploiting less well exposed parallel vein sets, including one small working that is currently actively exploiting a narrow vein. The Andrea Vein is the best exposed section of a gold mineralised corridor that extends for at least 3.5 kilometres in a northwest direction across the El Rodeo Concession and locally supports more than one gold mineralised structure. The remaining strike length, as well as some cross-strike structures is under-explored, only having been tested to date by regional rock chip sampling of rare outcrops and disused artisinal mine workings.

Condor has chosen to focus exploration activity on La India Project where Condor has established a significant concession holding consisting of four concessions covering an area of over 96 square kilometres. Condor already has significant experience in the district, having defined a maiden JORC compliant inferred resource of 41,000 ounces gold grading at 1.2 grams per tonne (the Cacao Resource announced by Condor on 18^th April 2008), located only 7 kilometres from the Andrea Vein. The El Rodeo Concession was selected for exploration ahead of the other recently acquired gold concessions in the district, Santa Barbara and Real de la Cruz, due to the large footprint of the surface mineralisation at El Rodeo which suggests the presence of a significant gold system. Future exploration on the other highly prospective new concessions in La India project is also planned. La India Mining District has a proven gold endowment and already contains the historic La India Gold Mine and the Mestiza Resource within 8 kilometres of the Andrea Vein. La India Mine produced approximately 576,000 ounces of gold at an average grade of 13.4 grams per tonne prior to its closure in 1956.

Mark Child, Chairman of Condor Resources, commented:

"Condor has been operating in Nicaragua for 5 years and is pleased to have commenced a drill and trench program in Nicaragua for the first time in just over 2 years. The strategy in Nicaragua over the last 24 months has been to reposition the Company by terminating expensive option and farm in agreements and take advantage of explorers handing back concessions during the recent economic downturn. This has resulted in the grant of 6 wholly owned concessions from the Government, which allow exploration and exploitation for a 25 year period. Since the grant of the 60 square kilometre El Rodeo concession in January 2010, Condor's geologists have conducted several field trips, reviewed the location of rockchip samples undertaken by a previous Canadian explorer, observed a large footprint of surface gold mineralisation, channel sampled at three locations, discovered disused artisanal mine workings and seen artisanal miners working on the concession. Our knowledge of El Rodeo will be enhanced further by the current program to either trench or drill every 100 meters along the 2 kilometre strike length of the Andrea Vein, which should build on the encouraging discoveries so far. "

Qualified Person's Declaration

The information in this announcement that relates to Exploration Results is based on information compiled by and reviewed by Dr Luc English, the Country Exploration Manager, who is a Chartered Geologist and Fellow of the Geological Society of London, and a geologist with fifteen years of experience in the exploration and definition of precious and base metal Mineral Resources. He has sufficient experience that is relevant to the style of mineralization and type of deposit under consideration, and to the type of activity which he is undertaking to qualify as a Qualified Person as defined in the June 2009 Edition of the AIM Note for Mining and Oil & Gas Companies. He consents to the inclusion in the announcement of the matters based on his information in the form and context in which they appear and confirms that this information is accurate and not false or misleading.

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For further information please visit www.condorresourcesplc.com or contact:

Condor Resources plc	Mark Child, Chairman [phone]	Luc English, Country Manager Nicaragua & El Salvador [phone]
Ambrian Partners Limited	Richard Swindells and Samantha Harrison [phone]
Farm Street Media	Simon Robinson [phone]

About Condor Resources Plc:

Condor Resources plc is an AIM listed exploration company focused on developing natural resource projects in Central America. The Company was admitted to AIM on 31st May 2006 with the stated strategy to prove up JORC Resources in Nicaragua and El Salvador. Condor has eight 100% owned licenses contained within four project areas in Nicaragua. In El Salvador, Condor has 100% ownership of four licences in two project areas.

Since Admission to AIM, Condor has increased its JORC compliant inferred resources from 350,000 ounces of gold and 18 million ounces of silver to 788,000 ounces of gold and 22 million ounces of silver. The Resource calculations are compiled by independent geologists Ravensgate and Geosure. As announced on 14^th June 2010 Condor's net cash position was circa £658,000 at the 31^st December 2009. Condor also owns approximately £1,496,000 worth of shares in Grafton Resources investments Limited as a result of a share exchange approved by shareholders at an AGM on 12^th June 2009. 

 

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