Celeste hits “high grades at significant widths” at South Crofty, including 6.83% tin equivalent

Celeste Mining Corp. (CVE:C) Thursday saw its shares pop over 14% after it reported “strong" drill results from its South Crofty tin project in the UK, with three metres at 2.5% tin equivalent, including one metre at 6.83% tin equivalent.

Shares of the tin miner rose 14.29% as at about 2:15 p.m. EDT, trading at four cents.

The drill results are from the underground drill program being carried out by Cornish Minerals in the Dolcoath section of the project. Celeste has an earn-in agreement in place to acquire 100% of Cornish Minerals, which owns South Crofty in Cornwall, England. 

Additional highlights from the most recent drill results include four metres at 1.1% tin equivalent in the South Entral lode, six metres at 0.53% tin equivalent in the Dolcoath main lode and six metres at 0.63% tin equivalent in an interstitial lode.

"These excellent results confirm high grades at significant widths in the South Entral lode and indicate that this will become a significant target for detailed delineation by mining into and exposing the lode for detailed sampling,” said CEO Alan Shoesmith.

Celeste said the results from the latest five drill holes confirm continuation of mineralization between wider spaced drilling. 

The “high grade” intercepts in the narrower South Entral zone and the main lode will allow for greater confidence in resources, the company noted, while showing potential for an increase in thickness and strike length of some individual lodes - particularly where the three metres at 2.5% tin equivalent intercept confirms continuity of the lode. 

Celeste added that the wide intercept in an interstitial lode confirms the extension of mineralization in an area which has previously been untested. 

During 2012, Cornish Minerals said it drilled 28 holes for a total of 5,926 metres as part of a drill program ongoing since 2008, which now totals 150 holes and 29,500 metres drilled. 

The holes reported today were drilled to the south of a decline driven to the west of the South Crofty mine, between the upper levels of mineralized structures that originally formed part of the Dolcoath mine that was closed in 1922 and separated from the South Crofty mine - closed in 1998 - by a major fault known as the Great Crosscourse.

Last month, a pilot water treatment plant was delivered to the site to test water treatment technology at a small scale. This will be progressively increased in capacity, Celeste said at the time, and the dewatering of Dolcoath at the permitted rate of 10,000 cu m/day is expected to start in the first or second quarter of this year. 

Along with South Crofty, Celeste is also looking at other tin, copper and copper-gold properties for exploration and development opportunities.

In November last year, the company raised $500,000 in new funds through a non-brokered private placement financing and earlier in the year unveiled an updated resource estimate for the Dolcoath section of the South Crofty project. 

The resource estimate, which used a 0.2% cut-off grade, revealed an inferred resource of 2.47 million tonnes grading 0.46% tin, 0.54% copper and 0.23% per cent zinc. 

The estimate also showed an exploration target of between 6.7 and 13.5 million tonnes with grades ranging from 1.4 to 1.8% tin, east of the Great Crosscourse at the South Crofty mine. 

Further, the report defined an exploration target of around 1.25 and 2.5 million tonnes with grades ranging between 1.25 and 1.6% tin in the Dolcoath deep and Roskear areas of South Crofty.