Aton reports on the re-commencement of field work at Abu Marawat and surface sampling results of up to 157 g/t gold from the Abu Gaharish prospect

VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Oct. 28, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Aton Resources Inc. (AAN: TSX-V) (“Aton” or the “Company") is pleased to update investors on the re-commencement of field activities at the Company’s 100% owned Abu Marawat Concession (“Abu Marawat” or the “Concession”), in the Eastern Desert of Egypt, see Figure 1.

Highlights:        

• Since the Hamama exploration camp was re-opened in June 2021, a new camp and core processing facility has been constructed at Rodruin;
• Energold’s diamond drill rig has now arrived in Egypt, and some ancillary drilling equipment and materials have already been delivered to the project site at Rodruin;
• The company has been operating 2 excavators since June 2021, which have been preparing drill roads and pads at both Hamama and Rodruin, ahead of the commencement of diamond drilling at Rodruin, now expected in mid-November 2021;
• Aton’s field teams have also undertaken a further phase of surface sampling and mapping at the Abu Gaharish prospect with a total of 83 samples having been submitted for assay, consisting of 56 grab and grab composite samples, 17 channel samples, and a further 10 QAQC samples;
• Of the selective grab and grab composite samples, 73% assayed greater than 1 g/t (or “ppm”) gold, 50% greater than 5 g/t gold, and 18 (32%) of the samples assayed greater than 10 g/t gold, with individual grades including 157, 58.4 and 47.6 g/t gold. Samples also returned assays of up to 524 g/t silver, 4.67% copper and 1.24% lead.
• Channel sampling returned grades of 7.88 g/t gold and 215 g/t silver over an interval of 1.4m.

“We are delighted to finally be back in the field at Abu Marawat after a pretty tough year and a half, with covid having made it very difficult for us in Egypt. Our drilling rig has now finally arrived in port in Egypt, after again suffering long covid-related export and shipping delays from Indonesia, and we now expect to be back drilling up on the hill at Rodruin within the next couple of weeks, after the rig has cleared customs and mobilised to site. After re-opening the camp at Hamama in June, and while we have been waiting for the rig, we have been busy however. As well as building and relocating to the new camp at Rodruin, which will be our new main exploration base going forwards, we have also been working at the Abu Gaharish prospect, which is our highest ranked exploration prospect, after Rodruin. And we are today very happy to be able to report more excellent sampling results from Abu Gaharish, again demonstrating its prospectivity,” said Tonno Vahk, Interim CEO. “These results again show the great potential of the Abu Gaharish prospect, with the many high grade gold assays mostly coming from new mineralised zones, structures, and veins that we had not previously identified. These new results, covering at least a 3 km strike length along the margin of the Gaharish granite, further confirm our belief in the presence of a very significant gold mineralised structural zone at Abu Gaharish. We believe that the Abu Gaharish mineralisation bears many similarities to that at the world-class Sukari deposit 200 km to the south. The results again indicate the prospectivity of our entire Abu Marawat Concession, and our intention is very much to finally drill test some of our regional exploration targets within the coming 12-18 months, starting with Abu Gaharish, as well as aggressively bringing the advanced exploration project at Rodruin forwards to a maiden mineral resource.”

Figure 1: https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/423473f9-415f-49df-849c-929ee34492c7

Re-commencement of field activities at Abu Marawat

The company re-opened the exploration camp at Hamama in June 2021, and has since then constructed a new camp and core processing facility at Rodruin (Figure 1). The exploration team re-located to the new Rodruin camp in mid-October 2021, and this will serve as the new main base for Aton’s field activities going forwards, due to its closer proximity to the high priority Abu Gaharish, Sir Bakis, Semna, Bohlog and Zeno regional exploration prospects, amongst others, as well as the advanced Rodruin exploration project. The Hamama camp has been placed on temporary care and maintenance and will be rapidly re-opened when further drilling is undertaken at Hamama and West Garida in 2022.

Since the re-commencement of field activities Aton has been operating 2 excavators at Hamama and Rodruin to prepare for the upcoming drill programmes at both these sites. The 2 excavators are currently both operating at Rodruin, in advance of the diamond drilling programme which is now expected to start in mid-November 2021, following the arrival of Energold’s drill rig into port in Egypt on October 22, 2021 (see news release dated June 14, 2021). Some ancillary materials and equipment have already been delivered to the Rodruin site in advance of the start of diamond drilling.

Additional channel sampling of newly exposed mineralisation in road cuttings at Rodruin has been undertaken, continuing on from the 2018 programme, and the first results from this sampling are expected soon.

Further sampling and mapping has also been carried out at the Abu Gaharish prospect, including surface and underground grab and channel sampling (see below), as well as a programme of wadi sediment sampling, with the samples being submitted for ultra-low level multi-element ionic leach (mobile metal ion) geochemical analysis. Results of the wadi sediment sampling programme are also expected soon.

Abu Gaharish surface sampling programme

A programme of surface sampling was undertaken between June and September 2021 at the Abu Gaharish area, which was partly guided by recent excavation of mineralised veins and structures by artisanal miners, covering a c. 3 km strike length on the southeastern margin of the Gaharish granite pluton (Figure 2). See news releases dated December 19, 2017 and April 23, 2018 for details of previous sampling programmes undertaken by the Company at Abu Gaharish. Most of the samples were collected from previously unidentified veins and structures.

Figure 2: https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/143a13d4-4ddd-4bc4-b864-63377fb395c5

A total of 73 samples were collected, mostly from surface, with some also from shallow underground workings that had been recently excavated by the artisanal miners. Of these 73 samples, 56 were selective grab and grab composite samples, and 17 were channel samples. A further 10 QAQC samples were submitted for analysis, comprising 4 duplicate samples, 4 blank samples, 1 flushing sample, and 1 standard sample of a certified reference material.

The results from the grab and grab samples were particularly encouraging, indicating the presence of high grade mineralised structures over a wide area, and are summarised in Table 1 below. Assay details of all the samples are provided in Appendix A.

Table 1: Summary of the grab and grab composite sampling results

10 of the selective grab and grab composite samples returned gold (“Au”) grades greater than 20 g/t, with fully 50% of the samples returning grades greater than 5 g/t Au. Individual samples returned grades including 157 g/t, 58.4 g/t, 47.6 g/t, 38.1 g/t, 35.9 g/t and 33.7 g/t Au.

Previous channel sampling at Abu Gaharish has returned mineralised intervals including 31.2m @ 1.04 g/t Au, and 3.6m @ 11.05 g/t Au (see news release dated December 19, 2017). During the current programme 4 short channel profiles were sampled, with a number of single individual channel samples also being collected. Channel samples were manually collected using hammer and chisel. Details are provided below in Table 2, with profile GHC-072 returning grades of 7.88 g/t Au and 215 g/t silver (“Ag”), over a 1.4m interval.

Table 2: Summary of channel sampling results

As well as further confirming the significant distribution of widespread gold mineralisation at Abu Gaharish the current programme also indicated the presence of significant silver (up to 524 g/t), copper (up to 4.67%), lead (up to 1.24%), arsenic (up to 324 ppm), bismuth (up to 124 ppm), cadmium (up to 344 ppm), molybdenum (up to 164 ppm), antimony (up to 3,100 ppm), and tungsten (up to 2,200 ppm) anomalism in some samples.

Mapping of the mineralised structures indicated a series of preferred mineralised orientations, which broadly confirmed Aton’s previous interpretation that mineralisation in the Abu Gaharish area is controlled by a series of conjugate structures within an overall structural zone that strikes approximately north-northeast and parallel to the contact between the country rocks and the Gaharish pluton. The country rocks in the general area consist of a series of metavolcanic and metasedimentary rocks, and ophiolitic serpentinites.

Aton’s geologists continue to interpret the mineralisation at Abu Gaharish as being related to a significant structural and gold mineralised zone localised by the contact between the late Gaharish granite pluton and the package of country rocks. The mineralisation appears to be hosted in a complex series of conjugate and ladder-type structures, and as these new results demonstrate some of these structures carry very significant gold grades.

Sample processing and analytical procedures

All samples were collected onsite and bagged up in cloth bags, and dried and crushed to -4mm at Aton’s onsite Hamama sample preparation laboratory, and split to a nominal c. 250-500g sample size.

The dried, crushed and split samples were shipped to ALS Minerals sample preparation facility at Marsa Alam, Egypt where they were pulverised to a size fraction of better than 85% passing 75 microns. From this pulverised material a further sub-sample was split off with a nominal c. 50g size, which was shipped on to ALS Minerals at Loughrea, Ireland for analysis.

Samples were analysed for gold by fire assay with an atomic absorption spectrometry finish (analytical code Au-AA23); and for a 34 multi-element suite using ICP atomic emission spectrometry (analytical code ME-ICP61).

High grade overlimit gold samples (>10 ppm Au) were re-analysed using analytical code Au-GRA21 (also fire assay, but with a gravimetric finish). High grade overlimit Ag and base metal samples (Ag >100 ppm; and Cu, Pb, and Zn >10,000 ppm or >1%) were re-analysed using the ore grade technique OG62 (consisting of a four acid digestion with an ICP finish).

About Aton Resources Inc.

Aton Resources Inc. (AAN: TSX-V) is focused on its 100% owned Abu Marawat Concession (“Abu Marawat”), located in Egypt’s Arabian-Nubian Shield, approximately 200 km north of Centamin’s world-class Sukari gold mine. Aton has identified numerous gold and base metal exploration targets at Abu Marawat, including the Hamama deposit in the west, the Abu Marawat deposit in the northeast, and the advanced Rodruin exploration prospect in the south of the Concession. Two historic British gold mines are also located on the Concession at Sir Bakis and Semna. Aton has identified several distinct geological trends within Abu Marawat, which display potential for the development of a variety of styles of precious and base metal mineralisation. Abu Marawat is 447.7 km² in size and is located in an area of excellent infrastructure; a four-lane highway, a 220kV power line, and a water pipeline are in close proximity, as are the international airports at Hurghada and Luxor.

Qualified person

The technical information contained in this News Release was prepared by Javier Orduña BSc (hons), MSc, MCSM, DIC, MAIG, SEG(M), Exploration Manager of Aton Resources Inc. Mr. Orduña is a qualified person (QP) under National Instrument 43-101 Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects.

For further information regarding Aton Resources Inc., please visit us at www.atonresources.com or contact:

TONNO VAHK

Interim CEO
Tel: +1 604 318 0390
Email: info@atonresources.com

Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

Some of the statements contained in this release are forward-looking statements. Since forward-looking statements address future events and conditions; by their very nature they involve inherent risks and uncertainties. Actual results in each case could differ materially from those currently anticipated in such statements.

Neither TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

Appendix A: Grab and grab composite samples