When management changes at a junior resource company it often worries shareholders. Is there a “problem”?
Mark Smethurst has stepped down as the COO of Tocvan Ventures (C.TOC) but remains a director of the company. Brodie Sutherland has stepped in as VP Exploration. Smethurst guided the company’s work trying to understand the “structures” which control the mineralization at its Pilar Gold-Silver Project in Sonora, Mexico. This lead to the identification of drill targets. Now it’s time to drill test.
Sutherland is a founder and director of Tocvan and he has 14 years experience managing exploration and resource definition drill programs across the globe.
“We plan to do 1500 meters of reverse circulation drilling across ten holes,” said Sutherland. “Our main objective is to understand the “Main Zone”. There has been historic drilling there. We want to step out around the main zone to look at structure and orientation. And we want to expand the known mineralization.”
“We’re using reverse circulation for a number of reasons,” said Sutherland. “We are going to drill straight into outcrop. Which is oxidized and fractured. You can lose a hole if you are diamond drilling. We want to complete all our holes and get the biggest possible sample. We want samples large enough that we can do some metallurgy work.”
“No drilling has been done on this project below 120 meters,” said Sutherland. “We are going to be drilling 150 meters deep with a couple of holes going to 200 meters.”
“The main zone outcrops on a hill,” said Sutherland. “There is enough low-grade material to open pit and our ideal scenario is a pit. But there are also high-grade gold shoots so there is lots of potential.”
The drill is already turning and Sutherland is hoping to complete the drill program in the next two weeks. With luck, assays will be ready in the early New Year.
There is no problem at Tocvan, just potential.
Update Tocvan has completed 400 meters of drilling which it announced in a press release Since we spoke to Sutherland, December 8th.