Wesmeg

Wesmeg

Gold Map

The Meliadine gold project (including the Wesmeq deposit) is located in the Kivalliq District of Nunavut in northern Canada, approximately 25 km northwest of Rankin Inlet on the west coast of Hudson Bay. A private all-weather access road constructed by Agnico Eagle connects Rankin Inlet to the Meliadine project. The current Meliadine exploration camp is located on the shore of Meliadine Lake, approximately 2.3 km east of the Tiriganiaq deposit.

The physical features of the Meliadine region have largely been determined by glaciation. The terrain consists predominantly of broadly rolling uplands and lowlands with little topographical relief (very few hills). Rankin Inlet is located on the shore of Hudson Bay with a mean elevation of 28 m above sea level. Strung out across the landscape are long, sinuous eskers. This undulating landscape is studded with innumerable lakes, ponds, and wetlands. Cryosols are the dominant soils, and are underlain by continuous permafrost with active layers that are usually moist or wet throughout the summer.

Mineralization:

The host Wesmeg Formation consists of chlorite-rich massive basalts, interlayered mafic volcaniclastics with rare gabbro dykes, and some interflow sediments comprising siltstone, mudstone (some graphitic) and minor iron formation. Occasional metre-scale ultramafic units are present in the sequence. The chert-rich and iron-poor rocks of the Lower Lean Iron Formation consist of metre-scale cherty iron formation units interbedded with centimetre-scale volcanic and sedimentary units. The iron formation units hosting the gold mineralization at Wesmeg vary in thickness from metres to tens of metres.

There appear to be two parts to the Wesmeg deposit: a northern and southern part. The northern part corresponds to the uppermost iron formation (650 lode). The stratigraphic sequence here strikes east-west and dips 65º to the north. This is similar to the east-west orientation of the Tiriganiaq gold deposit (about 400 m to the north of Wesmeg) where it is interpreted as the mineralized shear direction. The same orientation has been demonstrated by a high-resolution magnetic survey over the northern part of the Wesmeg area. The stratigraphic sequence in the southern part of the Wesmeg deposit strikes northwest-southeast and dips 50º to the north. This part has been named West-F zone.

Mineralization in Wesmeg is strongly associated with shearing and quartz veining within the Lower Lean Iron Formation, with thicker, higher-gold-grade sections. For modelling purposes the Wesmeg deposit is composed of 36 lodes classified as the Tiriganiaq 200 to 700 series (225 to 740).

Free gold occurs as discrete to coarse blebs, locally disseminated, associated with very coarse to finely disseminated arsenopyrite.

Alteration envelopes occur adjacent to quartz-calcite veining and are characterized by ankerite-, silica-, chlorite- and biotite-bearing assemblages that overprint the pre-existing regional greenschist metamorphic facies.

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