Collective Mining Announces Expansion of Apollo System with More Drilling Planned at Guayabales Project

Canadian mining company Collective Mining Ltd. (TSX: CNL) announced positive drilling results from its Guayabales project in Caldas, with a total of 11 new holes including three that have led to a significant expansion in the overall maximum known area of outcropping mineralization.

Drilling at these two holes, APC-63 and APC-64, expanded the vein zones within the Apollo porphyry system from a previous 260 meters by 220 meters to 320 meters by 220 meters — and this area still “remains open for expansion to the north,” according to Collective Mining.

Photo: Ari Sussman at a mining site in 2018. (Credit: Collective Mining)

Additional drilling is planned at these holes this month. “New drill pads are nearing completion and are designed to test for extensions to the shallow mineralization, with drilling set to commence before the end of September 2023,” stated Collective Mining.

Results and modeling at another drill hole, APC-67, has led the Toronto-based company to believe that it has found a further extension of the Apollo system and an increase in the strike length of the system by 65 meters. Additionally, the firm noted that, “Apollo remains open for further expansion in various directions.”

With these positive results analyzed, Ari Sussman, executive chairman at Collective Mining, said in a statement that the company will continue its drilling campaign for the coming months into 2024 at Guayabales, including testing of Target 6 “over the next few days … for the first time.”

“The Apollo system,” said Sussman, “continues to shine with the system continuing to expand … It is a busy and exciting time for the company with five drill rigs now operating at site.”

A detailed breakdown of the latest results can be found on Collective Mining’s website.

Reconnaissance Drill Program Outside the Apollo System

This summer, Collective Mining reported more positive results from exploration diamond drilling on the first of six well-mineralized and outcropping targets located within a 400-meter radius of the Apollo system. The company has three diamond drill rigs on site with a fourth rig expected to arrive in the near term.

The Apollo porphyry system is a bulk tonnage copper-silver-gold system with metal endowment. The system owes its metal endowment to an older copper-silver and gold porphyry system being overprinted by younger precious metal-rich, carbonate base metal vein systems within magmatic, hydrothermal inter-mineral breccia and diorite porphyry bodies.

“It is exciting to see that APC-54, which is our very first reconnaissance hole outside of the Apollo porphyry deposit in 2023, has intersected visual mineralization over two intervals,” said Sussman at the time. “Given our past success in making discoveries at the Guayabales project, I am confident that if we drill with persistence, we will make a fresh discovery in 2023.”

Juan Guevara contributed to this article.