The Cominco/Teck-operated Sullivan mine was once a major producer of base metals.
Coast Copper (TSXV: COCO) has doubled the size of its 100% owned Sully property in southeastern British Columbia to 108.5 square kilometres hectares by staking and entering into multiple arm’s-length purchase agreements.
The property is adjacent to PJX Resources’ (TSXV: PJX) Dewdney Trail project, where it recently made a massive sulphide discovery near the past-producing Sullivan mine near Kimberley, BC. The Cominco/Teck-operated Sullivan mine was once a major producer of base metals. From 1909 until its closure in 2001, it produced 26 million tonnes of lead, zinc and silver concentrates.
Following PJX’s Sullivan-style discovery, in February 2024, Coast Copper staked a total of three mineral claims comprising the Sully property, and has now expanded its size.
On its website, the company said its property covers ground that hosts the strike extension to the north of the favourable Aldridge Formation, cross structures to the northeast and additional ground to the east of the PJX find.
Historical regional geochemical surveys on the Sully property have returned anomalous results of silver and lead in-stream sediments, which the Coast Copper team is expected to follow up on. A rock grab sample taken in 1999 returned 1.675 grams per tonne (g/t) gold, 228 g/t silver, 3.83% copper, 3,010 parts per million (ppm) lead and 4,270 ppm zinc, highlighting the exploration potential of the area within 10 km of the PJX discovery.
“We are pleased to have increased the size of our Sully property in the historic Sullivan mining camp as it is prospective for both Sullivan-style massive sulphides and also copper, gold and molybdenum porphyries associated with Cretaceous aged monzonite and syenite intrusions,” Coast Copper CEO Adam Travis said in a news release.
“Before PJX made their discovery of Sullivan-style mineralization on claims adjacent to ours, they also noted significant, intrusion-related gold, copper and silver mineralization with values up to 15.59 g/t gold, 1.11% Cu and 721 g/t,” he said.
Meanwhile, the company remains focused on the Empire Mine property, also in BC, that was previously explored by Cominco. This 157.5-sq.-km. land package holds a mineral resource estimate of 594,000 tonnes in the inferred category grading 0.51% copper and 3.52 g/t gold.
Shares of Coast Copper jumped 18.1% at the end of Tuesday’s session, giving the junior explorer a market capitalization of C$4.4 million ($3.2m).
