West Timmins Mining and Lake Shore Gold intercept broad, high grade gold zone at Thunder Creek

West Timmins Mining (TSX: WTM) and Lake Shore Gold (TSX: LSG) reported a spectacular intersect from ongoing drilling at their Thunder Creek Joint Venture in Timmins, Ontario, Canada today. Drill hole TC-09-68b intercepted an impressive 83.4 meters grading 12.75 grams per tonne gold, and included a bonanza zone of 11 meters @ 38.22 grams per tonne gold. Drill hole TC-09-68b was drilled into the ‘Rusk Zone’. Four drills are currently undertaking a 22,000 metre diamond drill program on the Thunder Creek Property testing the lateral and vertical extensions of the Rusk and Porphyry Zones, and other exploration targets on the Property. The Thunder Creek gold system has now been traced over 750 metres down-plunge and 175 metres along strike at the 750 vertical level. The Rusk and Porphyry Zones remain open to depth.

The drill result adds to previously reported results at Thunder Creek which suggest the two companies may be on to a very significant gold deposit. Since originally reporting excellent drill results at Thunder Creek, which is located only 800 meters from the 1.3 million ounce Timmins West Gold Deposit - which is operated by Lake Shore Gold - West Timmins has been the subject of takeover speculation.
Lake Shore Gold has also received its fair share of bid speculation, with London listed Hochschild Mining (LSE: HOC), who is a significant shareholder, often seen as the likely consolidator of the project and surrounding area.
West Timmins Mining holds a 40% interest in the Thunder Creek Property with the remaining 60% held by project operator Lake Shore Gold.
"This is one of the broadest, high-grade gold intercepts ever reported from the Timmins Gold Camp, which ranks as the largest gold camp in North America with over 70 million ounces of gold produced over the last century" said Darin Wagner, President and CEO of West Timmins Mining Inc. "Broad high-grade gold intercepts like the one reported today, are very rare and characteristic of only a very few special situations in the Camp, including the world-class 32 million ounce Hollinger-McIntyre gold system. The Thunder Creek gold system continues to exhibit many of the hallmarks of the Hollinger-McIntyre system including abundant coarse-grained visible gold mineralization, gold mineralization over extremely broad widths in multiple zones proximal to and hosted within a porphyritic intrusion and the association of the gold mineralization with a suite of base metals including tungsten, molybdenum, zinc and lead."

Tony Makuch, President and CEO of Lake Shore Gold, commented: "The widths and grades of the intercepts reported from wedge Hole TC09-68b are clearly our most encouraging to date and demonstrate that we are dealing with a large gold system. The results highlight the potential of Thunder Creek to host a significant orebody with multiple horizons covering different geological settings, including the Rusk and Porphyry zones, as well as a new porphyry unit that has now been discovered at the bottom of TC09-68b. We are currently awaiting results from one wedge hole with four additional holes in progress. We have a total of four drills operating on the property, with approximately 15,000 metres of the current 22,000 metre drill program having now been reported. We have also added a drill on our 100% owned Timmins Mine property to explore for new mineralization along the north-east extension of the same geological contact hosting the Rusk Zone."

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