Nunavut gold company explores promising Inuit-owned site near Meadowbank

Agnico Eagle’s exploration camp at Amaruq, about 50 km northwest of the Meadowbank mine. (PHOTO COURTESY OF AGNICO EAGLE)

An Agnico Eagle geologist receives a box of core samples from the Amaruq site this past August. (PHOTO COURTESY OF AGNICO EAGLE)

Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd. will expand exploration next year at a promising new gold property about 50 kilometres northwest of its Meadowbank gold mine, the company said Sept. 29 in a release.

The project, renamed “Amaruq,” covers 408 square km of land that is 100 per cent Inuit-owned, under a form of ownership that includes rights to subsurface resources.

Agnico Eagle acquired it in April 2013, subject to a mineral exploration agreement with Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. The company began an exploratory drilling program in July 2013 that resumed this past July.

The results of that work are so promising, the company is now studying options for constructing an exploration road from Meadowbank to the Amaruq site.

And for the spring of 2015, Agnico Eagle will expand the size of its camp to accommodate 60 workers, up from the current 25.

The company also begun an environmental baseline study for use in a possible future permitting application, and started preliminary engineering work on a potential all-weather road from Amaruq to Meadowbank.

“Given the size and scope of the discovery, studies are currently underway to evaluate how Amaruq could be incorporated into the Meadowbank operational plan and possibly linked with the Meliadine project,” Sean Boyd, AEM’s president and chief executive officer, said in the news release.

As for the 142 holes that Agnico Eagle workers have drilled since July 2013, the company says they “reveal multiple mineralized zones within a significant corridor.”

That includes drilling in August and September 2014 at a location called Whale Tail.

In one section, on the southwest side of Whale Lake, drillers brought up core samples whose grades range from 6.1 grams to 20.4 grams per tonne.

And they have also started probing an area called Boulder Field where they have found large blocks of quartz material with veins of gold visible on the surface.