Sendero Resources Corp. announced that mobilization has started for drilling at its Peñas Negras Project on the Vicuña Belt in La Rioja, Argentina. Highlights: Drilling to commence in the first half of January 2024 with an initial 4,500m of diamond drilling.

Three priority drill-ready porphyry copper-gold targets have been selected for initial drilling, La Peña, Tamberías and Cerro Verde South - all of which are untested by drilling. The La Ollita target has been upgraded to high priority following ongoing targeting studies and revised ranking. Many of the key geological, geochemical, and geophysical features seen at other deposits in the Vicuña Belt, such as Filo del Sol and Josemaria deposits are replicated in Sendero's priority drill targets.

La Peña Target: La Peña has many typical features of Andean copper-gold porphyry deposits. The mineralised system is exposing at an optimum level of erosion, just above the interpreted high-grade copper-gold zone. Favorable features of the exposed diorite porphyry are intense potassic alteration, stockwork magnetite-quartz veining, and the presence of copper sulfides and oxides.

Two initial holes are programmed at La Peña. Tamberías Target: Tamberías comprises an outcropping diorite porphyry with classic porphyry style quartz-magnetite veining. Pervasive hydrothermal alteration is zoned from a potassic core overprinted chlorite-epidote. The area shows Cu-Au-Mo geochemistry and peripheral Zn-Cd-Pb in Ionic Leach and conventional soils coinciding with a magnetic high and a quartz vein stockwork zone.

Trenching to the east of the outcropping diorite porphyry has revealed a breccia zone with strongly anomalous Au-Cu-Ag geochemistry in channel sampling and extensions of the diorite porphyry under the cover with fresh sulphides, mainly pyrite and minor chalcopyrite and chalcocite. Cerro Verde South Target: At Cerro Verde South there is extensive porphyry related alteration coincides with major magnetite-quartz stockwork zones. In the same areas highly anomalous Cu-Au-Mo with a peripheral Zn-Pb-Cd halos have been defined by ionic leach, talus fines and conventional soil geochemistry.

These favourable features also coincide with magnetic highs. Two drillholes are initially programmed for the "south target" within Cerro Verde South, where intense stockwork veining in dacite and diorite porphyries has been observed. This coincides with the zone of geochemical anomalies and strong magnetism.

The area known as the "green whale" has shown significant potential for hosting an economic porphyry system due to the presence of high-density quartz-magnetite veining with associated breccias linked to known Cu-Au mineralization in historical drilling. A third drill hole is programmed into the "green whale" target. La Ollita: The La Ollita target has been upgraded to high priority following ongoing targeting studies and revised ranking.

Reassessment of historical Eldorado Gold drilling conducted in the mid-1990s revealed that several deeper holes (250-300m) intersected quartz diorite porphyry towards the bottom of the holes associated with quartz-magnetite stockwork veining and potassic alteration. Some of the holes ended in highly anomalous copper and gold values including drill hole PNR 33 returning 10m at 0.79 g/t Au and 1400 ppm Cu from 260m. The holes with quartz diorite porphyry coincide with a gradient IP chargeability anomaly measuring approximately 500m x 800m.

Overlying and extending laterally away from the porphyry centre is an epithermal vein overprint associated with pervasive phyllic alteration (quartz-sericite-pyrite-clay). Many of the near-surface Eldorado Gold drill holes returned highly anomalous gold grades (0.5-3.0 g/t) over potentially mineable widths. Induced Polarization (IP) and ground magnetic surveys are currently being completed along with Ionic Leach geochemical soil sampling with the aim of refining the porphyry centre/s below the know epithermal system and selecting optimum drill targets.