Gold and Silver miners (Jr and Exploration)

[Edge83]

First Majestic Provides Review of 2017 Exploration Program and Plans for 2018

Tue January 9, 2018 7:00 AM|GlobeNewswire|About: AG
VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Jan. 09, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- FIRST MAJESTIC SILVER CORP. (AG) (TSX:FR) (the "Company" or “First Majestic”) is pleased to announce a year-end review of its 2017 exploration program and plans for its 2018 exploration program.

2017 HIGHLIGHTS

Completed over 156,500 metres of diamond drilling consisting of 807 holes, a new Company record, across the six operating mines and the Plomosas silver project
New discovery at Ermitaño West near the Santa Elena Silver/Gold mine:
EW-16-09 intersected 3.0 g/t gold and 50 g/t silver over 37.0 metres (est. true width)
EW-16-06 intersected 4.7 g/t gold and 277 g/t silver over 12.9 metres (est. true width)
New discoveries and relevant extensions at:
Santa Elena – Main Vein extension to the west
La Encantada – new La Fe replacement ore body discovery
La Parrilla – discovery of the Cerro de Santiago vein parallel to Rosario
Del Toro – Santa Teresa vein south extension continues
San Martin – Hedionda vein extension continues
La Guitarra –Nazareno north-west extension and Nazareno de Ancas finding
Plomosas – Plomosas vein extension and finding of a new stockwork system
Advanced optimization program designed to improve metallurgical recoveries with concentrate cleaning upgrades across all processing plants
An initial resource estimate for the Plomosas silver project expected to be released by the end of 2018 with over 17,500 metres drilled in 2017 and an estimated 22,000 metres planned in 2018
Updated Mineral Reserve and Resource estimates across all mines being prepared now and scheduled for release by end of Q1 2018
Keith Neumeyer, CEO and President, states: “2017 was an exceptional year for exploration and technological innovations. Across seven of our assets, we had up to 24 active rigs and drilled over 156,500 metres resulting in a new exploration record for First Majestic. The Company is now working diligently to incorporate these successful results into an updated Reserve and Resource estimate which is expected to be released by the end of the first quarter of 2018. Our two major discoveries for 2017 were the Cerro de Santiago vein at La Parrilla and the Ermitaño vein at Santa Elena. It is also becoming evident that there is a significant opportunity around Santa Elena and La Parrilla to expand the size of the known mineral resources. As a result of the recent discoveries, we are allocating additional exploration resources in 2018 in order to improve Life of Mine at both operations.”

2017 Drilling Program

The objectives of the 2017 drill program were to:

upgrade Resources to Reserves at La Parrilla, Del Toro, La Guitarra, San Martin, La Encantada and Santa Elena;
increase or add new Mineral Resources at the six operating mines, with a focus at Nazareno in La Guitarra and the Ermitaño West project in Santa Elena; and
continue the aggressive exploration program at the Plomosas silver project which commenced in 2016.
The Company completed over 156,500 metres of diamond drilling in 2017 consisting of approximately 21,210 metres at Santa Elena, 15,370 metres at La Encantada, 28,840 metres at La Parrilla, 19,550 metres at Del Toro, 26,075 metres at San Martin, 27,880 metres at La Guitarra and 17,610 metres at Plomosas. Major milestones in 2017 were the acquisition of El Gachi property (48,157 hectares) and the option agreement to explore and acquire the Los Hernandez property (5,802 hectares), both adjoining to the north of the Santa Elena property package, as well as the finding and extension of additional resources at the six operating mines and the Plomosas silver project:

Santa Elena – Main Vein extension to the west, Tortuga vein extension at depth and Alejandra veins extensions at depth
La Encantada – El Conejo vein and La Fe replacement findings
La Parrilla – Discovered the Cerro de Santiago vein, North-South vein and Rosarios west extension
Del Toro – Santa Teresa south extension and Dolores at depth
San Martin – La Veladora and Hedionda veins extension
La Guitarra – Coloso extension to the south-east, Nazareno north-west extension and Nazareno de Ancas finding
Plomosas – Plomosas vein extension and finding of a new stockwork system
The Company is now preparing to release updated Mineral Reserve and Resource estimates at the end of March 2018. It should be noted that none of the drilling that occurred in 2017 has been included in any of the current Mineral Reserve or Resource estimates released in any of the Company’s National Instrument (NI) 43-101 Technical Reports. Efforts will be made to include as much as possible in the March 2018 update with a cut-off of December 31, 2017. However, due to lengthy time requirements for assay results and block modelling, some of the 2017 drilling results may not be available until the Company’s March 2019 update with a cut-off of December 31, 2018.

Exploration Outlook for 2018

Following the successful exploration results in 2017, the Company is planning to continue with an aggressive exploration budget in 2018 with an estimated 183,000 metres of planned drilling across its six producing mines and the Plomosas Silver Project. A mine-by-mine breakdown of the 2018 exploration program is included in the table below.

https://seekingalpha.com/pr/17041497-first-majestic-provides-review-2017-exploration-program-plans-2018