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The Phoenix project is a joint venture between Golden Predator (40%) and Madison Minerals Inc. (60%) in the Battle Mt. gold district, Lander Co., NV. The property is comprised of 368 unpatented and patented mineral claims which cover the auriferous Virgin fault zone immediately to the north and west of Newmont's giant Phoenix gold mine. The Virgin fault and related secondary structures are the mineralizing conduits to over 10 million ounces of gold mineralization mined historically from the Fortitude gold mine and from mineral reserves currently being worked by Newmont.
Gold mineralization on the joint venture property is identified on the Buena Vista, Virgin and Plumas trends. Drilling by Madison began in 2002 with a nine hole, reverse circulation drilling program to test high grade gold mineralization along the Virgin fault as well as nearby sub horizontal, stratigraphically-controlled gold mineralization. Madison was successful in confirming that similar stratigraphy and the ore controlling Virgin fault zone that is present on Newmont's Phoenix Property is present on the Madison property. Assay highlights from the Madison drilling in 2002 include 105 feet grading 0.512 oz/t Au including 3.24 oz/t Au over 15 feet in drill hole MAD-05, 30 feet 0.205 oz/t in MAD-08. Follow up drilling in 2003 was designed to: a) follow up on Madison's previous drilling, b) evaluate the geological character and structures of new targets identified in a TITAN MT-IP geophysical survey carried out by Quantec Geoscience, and c) evaluate the upper portion of the Virgin fault zone, the stratigraphically controlled mineralization leading away from it and the projected intersections of these two mineralized features. Assay highlights of this program include: 50 feet grading 0.0.263 oz/t Au in MAD-18, 225 feet grading 0.101 oz/t in MAD-20, 150 feet grading 0.189 oz/t Au in MAD-31 and 45 feet grading 0.152 oz/t in MAD-32.
Drilling resumed on the Phoenix JV in 2006 with a total of 31,690 feet in 49 drill holes being completed. This drilling identified newly discovered splay structures within the Virgin fault zone as well as confirmed the continuity of the steep gold mineralization in the main Virgin fault and the sub horizontal gold mineralization outlined in Madison's earlier drilling. Highlights from the 2006 program include: 9.1 m (29.8 ft) grading 4.88 gm/t (0.142 oz/t) Au in MAD-36 from steeply dipping mineralization; 22.9 m (75.1 ft) grading 1.52 gm/t (0.044) Au from MAD-74 within a sub horizontal mineralized zone; and 13.7 m (44.9 ft) grading 9.43 gm/t (0.275 oz/t) Au from MAD-81 and 42.6 m (139.7 ft) grading 2.62 gm/t (0.077 oz/t) from MAD-43 both intersecting the newly discovered splay structures.
A $2.5 million reverse circulation and diamond drilling program to further test these gold-rich zones was initiated by Madison in July 2007 and completed in November. Assay results are pending for this work.
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