Resumen
The Ana Paula Project is located in the State of Guerrero, Mexico, approximately 180 kilometres from Mexico City. Ana Paula comprises a 56,000 hectare land package within the Guerrero Gold Belt, a prolific mining area that hosts several large commercial gold operations. The Project lies within the Sierra Madre mountain range where topography can range from moderate to rugged with elevations varying from 900 to over 1,460 meters above sea level (masl). The Balsas River, which divides the Sierra Madre Mountains into north and south ranges, flows just south of the project area. Argonaut acquired the property in 2020 from Alio Gold, who acquired it in 2015.
Geología
Mineralization in the Guerrero Gold Belt (GGB) is characterized as a skarn porphyry mineralization related to an early Tertiary intrusive event. Ana Paula is located along the northwesterly trend of the GGB where it straddles a boundary between two older tectonic sub-terranes; a volcanic-volcaniclastic arc assemblage to the west and a thick carbonate platform sequence overlain by younger marine deposits to the east.
In general, four gold depositional settings are recognized at Ana Paula, including:
- Quartz-sulphide and quartz-carbonate-sulphide veinlets, stockworks with sulphide clots and disseminations in both intrusions and hornfels.
- Narrow semi-massive sulphide contact replacement of limestone or hornfels/skarn at the intrusion contacts.
- Sulphide clots, rims and masses in narrow contact replacement of breccia hosted in intrusions at or near the sedimentary contacts and/or fault contacts (detachment faults).
- Associated with a sulphide constituent within breccia matrix and with sulphide replacement textures within structurally controlled breccia formed oblique to the dominant northerly trending westerly dipping stratigraphy.
Historia
Active exploration of the Ana Paula project began in 2005 and has taken place continuously since 2010. The primary means of exploration has been by core drilling from the surface. Drilling began with Goldcorp in 2005, continued with Newstrike 2010-2015, and continued with Alio Gold prior to the acquisition by Argonaut.