Eastmain begins 15,000 metre drill program at Eastmain Mine property in Quebec

Eastmain Resources Inc (TSE:ER) announced Tuesday it began a 15,000 metre drill program at its 100% owned Eastmain Mine property in Quebec.

The program is intended to expand the deposit, which is divided into zones A, B, and C, beyond its historical resources of 255,750 ounces of gold. The 109 historical drill holes returned grades averaging 18.9 grams per tonne (g/t) gold, 15.9 g/t silver and 0.24% copper over an average thickness of 3.93 metres.

Eastmain's 2010 drill program on the A and B zones confirmed that the mineralizations continue laterally beyond the limits of historical development.

To date, the most significant drill result was found in the B zone over 13.2 metres at a vertical depth of 170 metres, and, on average, graded 53.28 g/t gold, 59.2 g/t silver and 0.2% copper.

The 8,014 hectare area consists of 152 mineral claims and sits in the Upper Eastmain River Greenstone belt, some 800 kilometres north of Montreal.

The property was acquired by Eastmain in 2007 by the issuance of one million common share, 500,000 share purchase warrants and $2.5 million in cash to Campbell Resources Inc.

The current program will test the depth extension of the A and B zones below 350 metres, and will include surface exploration along the northwest and southeast trend of the deposit, which extends for more than ten kilometres, Eastmain said.

The Toronto, Ontario-based gold exploration company's stock on the Toronto Stock Exchange rose 6.5% to trade at $1.31 per share as of 2:36 pm EDT.