New discoveries at historic Pine Point

Osisko Metals Inc. April 24 said the latest round of results from its extensive drill program at Pine Point show the potential for continuous high-grade zinc mineralization between historically mined pits on the property.

The Pine Point property, located roughly 42 kilometers (26 miles) east of Hay River, is the site of a historical mine operated by Cominco (now Teck Resources) from 1964 to 1988. During that time, Cominco mined zinc-lead ore from a series of 50 surface and underground deposits along a 60-kilometer (37 miles) trend. In all, Cominco discovered roughly 90 such deposits on the property.

Since acquiring Pine Point early in 2018, Osisko has carried out extensive drilling aimed at converting the unclassified near-surface historical resources left by Cominco into current mineral resources and locally extend known zones of mineralization.

As of December, Osisko has outlined 38.4 million metric tons of inferred resource averaging 4.58 percent (3.9 billion pounds) zinc and 1.85 percent (1.6 billion lb) lead.

The property's East Mill zone hosts 5.5 million metric tons of this inferred resource averaging 3.76 percent zinc and 1.9 percent lead.

The latest batch of assay results is from 127 drill holes completed in the M-40 area within the East Mill zone.

M40-18-PP-072, a definition hole drilled within the resource area, cut 12.17 meters of 8.16 percent zinc and 1.24 percent lead.

M40-18-PP-128, drilled outside of the current resource, cut six meters of 6.12 percent zinc and 4.31 percent lead.

The M-40 area contains six modeled pits in the reported current mineral resource estimate but also exhibits exploration potential for continuous zinc mineralization between the pits for 1,070 meters along strike. Osisko said this area was poorly tested during historical drill programs and geological evidence suggests two parallel tabular deposits to be further explored.

This will be one of the primary targets of a drill program at Pine Point this year that will primarily focus on new discoveries.

To help identify drill targets at M-40 and other areas of the property, Osisko plans to fly a gravity geophysical survey over Pine Point this year.

"This type of survey is relatively new and is the right tool for Pine Point mineralization that is not conductive nor magnetic; but it has a good density contrast and that is what the gravity survey can detect," said Osisko Metals President and CEO Jeff Hussey. "Of particular interest is the exploration potential around the current M-40 resource modelled pits that could significantly expand the currently outlined high grade mineralization."

–SHANE LASLEY