VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA, Nov. 2, 2009 (Marketwire) -- Paragon Minerals Corporation (TSX VENTURE:PGR) ("Paragon") is pleased to provide an update on its 100%-owned Lake Douglas VMS project, located 20 kilometres southwest of the Duck Pond Cu-Zn mine in central Newfoundland. Recent till sampling by the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador has returned a significant geochemical anomaly at the Flexure Prospect.
The regional till sampling program carried out by the Geological Survey Division of the Newfoundland and Labrador Department of Mines and Energy (Open File report 12A/1449; Smith et. al., 2009) was released on October 27, 2009, and covered in part, the Lake Douglas project. The survey returned a highly-anomalous till sample at Paragon's Flexure Prospect, a priority target area on the property. The sample returned assays of 163 ppb gold, 288 ppm copper, 492 ppm zinc, 1479 ppm lead and 10278 ppm arsenic, making it one of the most significant till samples within the Victoria Lake Volcanic Belt.
The Flexure Prospect is located five kilometres southwest and along strike of the Lake Douglas massive sulphide discovery (see Paragon News Release dated December 13, 2007). The new, highly anomalous till sample is underlain by similar hydrothermally altered volcanic stratigraphy to that hosting the massive sulphides, and coincides with a 400 metre long multi-element (copper, lead, zinc, silver, gold) soil geochemical anomaly and a high priority airborne EM target. No drilling has been completed in this area.
To date, exploration work completed by Paragon has outlined four high priority areas on the property with excellent potential to host large-tonnage base metal VMS deposits. One area, the Lake Douglas prospect has been drill tested (7 holes, 2,062 metres) with one drillhole (LD07-04) intersecting semi-massive to massive sulphide mineralization grading up to 6.30% zinc, 4.19% lead, 0.39% copper and 82.86 g/t silver over 6.45 metres.
"The recent government geochemical survey results underscore the potential for additional massive sulphides to be discovered on our property," said Mike Vande Guchte, President & CEO of Paragon Minerals Corporation. "With only seven drillholes in the project area and numerous attractive, untested VMS targets, we consider the potential for new base metal discoveries to be excellent." Paragon is looking at various alternatives to advance the project.
The Lake Douglas project is located 20 kilometres southwest of Teck Resources Duck Pond Cu-Zn Mine and immediately south of Paragon's 100%-owned South Tally Pond project. The volcano-sedimentary stratigraphy at Lake Douglas is very similar to other sediment-rich VMS base metal camps such as the world-class Bathurst Mining Camp in northern New Brunswick.
Paragon Minerals Corporation is a Canadian-based mineral exploration company listed on the TSX Venture Exchange.
