With the goal of triggering a new gold rush in the Val-D'Or region of Quebec (who's name literally means "valley of gold"), the Integra Gold Corp - a Vancouver-based mining company - launched the Integra Gold Rush Challenge. With a prize of $1 million CAD, the company put out the call for innovative and creative ways to located untapped gold deposits in their Lamaque and Sigma mines in Val-D'Or back in June of 2015.
Since that time, 1341 innovators and 95 teams have joined the competition. With their eyes on the prize, these teams have been busy over the past few months, pouring over and crunching some 75 years worth of mining data (a total of over 6 terabytes) to located where these deposits are hidden. And as of last Wednesday (Dec. 2nd), the window for submissions has officially closed, and the judging process has now begun!
In the meantime, Integra has announced some encouraging results that indicate just how much gold remains to be found in the Val-D'Or region. In November of this year, the company announced the results from their 2015 winter drill program, which took place in the Triangle Zone, 2.5 km southeast of the city of Val-D'Or. These test drillings are routinely done by mining companies in order to increase their understanding of the geology and the quality of the ore deposits in a target region.
The latest drill results show that there is still plenty of gold ore to be found in the Lamaque Mines of Val-D'Or. Credit: minerals.usgs.com
According to a November 10th news release, the drill program led to a refinement of a number of key resource estimation parameters. Specifically, Integra noted a 21% increase in Indicated Resources, and a 400% increase in Inferred Resources from the drill area. This means that the company now estimates that there to be between 627,810 and 871,530 ounces of gold deposits in the vicinity, with an average grade of between 6.89 and 7.37 grams per tonne (g/t).
In addition, in a news release issues on Dec. 9th, Integra announced the final results from its 2015 Parallel Deposit infill drill program. Located 2 km northwest of the Triangle Deposit in the South Lamaque Gold Region, the test drilling at Parallel revealed gold deposits that averaged 31.45 g/t Gold at a depth of over 1.7 meters, 21.08 g/t at depths of over 2.3 meters, and 19.58 g/t at depths of over 3.3 meters. As Integra President and CEO Stephen de Jong said of these latest finds:
"The results announced today continue to support our high level of confidence in both the continuity and grade of mineralization at the Parallel deposit. Although the Triangle deposit has emerged as the primary focus at Lamaque, Parallel remains a viable possible source of additional high-grade mineralized material during the production phase at Lamaque."
All of this is exciting news for the teams searching for the largest deposits that are believed to lie further underground in the Lamange and Sigma mines. And whoever can locate them using the most creative, innovative and cost-effective solution will be entitled to a prize of a cool $1 million CAD.
Want to see who wins the prize? Then go to the Intregra Gold Rush page and start following the Challange! If you have a challenge you'd like to make happen, then head on over to the Launch a Challenge page and be prepared to make a difference!
Top Image Credit: intregragold.com
