VANCOUVER (miningweekly.com) – Colombia-focused junior explorer Cordoba Minerals has encountered high-grade copper-gold mineralisation outside of the current resource shell, demonstrating significant potential to expand the current resource estimate.

The company reported on Tuesday that ongoing drilling at the San Matias project – over 900 m of strike length within the central and southern parts of the Alacran deposit – has indicated that previous drilling in the southern-most part of the property was collared too far west and that the copper/gold deposit is offset to the east by post-mineralisation faulting.

This indicates potential for undrilled strike extensions of almost 500 m, the company announced.

TSX-V-listed Cordoba, with its joint venture partner, High Power Exploration, a private mineral exploration company indirectly controlled by mining entrepreneur Robert Friedland’s Ivanhoe Industries, said that eight drill holes completed at the Alacran deposit focused on continuity of copper/gold mineralisation in central parts of the deposit and tested southern extensions of the Alacran trend, where post-mineral faulting had been interpreted to have offset copper/gold mineralisation to the east.

Among the highlights were Hole ACD060, which returned 42 m grading 0.92% copper and 0.23 g/t gold (or 1.1% copper-equivalent, from 18 m); ACD063, which returned 30 m grading 0.66% copper and 0.69 g/t gold (for 1.18% copper-equivalent, from 78 m); and ACD064, which returned 48 m grading 1.7% copper and 0.79 g/t gold (for 2.3% copper-equivalent, from 51 m).

“The discovery of the offsetting fault in the southern part of the Alacran deposit demonstrates the significant potential for the deposit to grow. Visible gold in ACD063 was confirmed by assay results. This indicates that cross-cutting gold-bearing structures are found over at least 600 m of the Alacran deposit’s strike,” Cordoba president and CEO Mario Stifano said in a news release.

Drilling at San Matias earlier this year has intersected bonanza gold veins at Alacran, returning 0.9 m grading 4 440 g/t gold, plus 10.25% copper, 24.7% zinc and 347 g/t silver in drill hole ACD036.