The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
Provides a summary of another incredible year of productivity North of 60 Mining News – January 5, 2024
A road-accessible project adjacent to Yukon's border with Northwest Territories, the 940-square-kilometer (363 square miles) Macmillan Pass project covers a roughly 55-kilometer (34 miles) trend of zinc, lead, silver, and copper mineralization.
In a few short years, Fireweed Metals has grown its portfolio with the addition of the Gayna River and Mactung properties.
Fireweed Metals Corp. Dec. 28 gave a year-end review of its accomplishments from 2023 and ushered in the new year with expectations to continue advancing its flagship Macmillan Pass zinc-lead-silver-copper project in southeast Yukon, the adjacent world-class Mactung tungsten project spanning the Northwest Territories-Yukon border, and its Gayna River zinc-lead-silver project about 180 kilometers (112 miles) north of MacPass in NWT, Canada.
"2023 has been another extraordinary and record-breaking year for Fireweed," said Fireweed Metals CEO Brandon Macdonald. "The accomplishments are numerous, from drilling our best-ever drill hole at Macpass to completing the field season safely with zero lost time injuries."
Initially targeting 16,000 meters of drilling at MacPass in 2023, Fireweed more than double its drilling in 2022, and wrapped its season toward the end of October with over 22,500 meters drilled, tripling the previous year's program.
While easily the largest drill program to date, it is what was accomplished with this drilling that made 2023 shine.
The 2023 program began by targeting a gap between the best holes drilled at the Boundary Main and adjacent Boundary West targets – NB22-002 (124 meters averaging 12.4% zinc, 1.3% lead, and 45.9 grams per metric ton silver) and NB22-023 (298 meters averaging 4.5% zinc, 1.4% lead, and 30.9 g/t silver).
The first results of the season were immediately a game-changer in that they demonstrated the presence of a high-grade layer of massive sulfides and a stratiform mineralization feeder system that connected the two targets.
Highlights from the 2023 drilling at Boundary include:
• 38 meters (19 meters true-width) averaging 9.12% zinc, 1.5% lead, and 52.6 g/t silver in hole NB23-001.
• 71.9 meters (40 meters true-width) averaging 6.48% zinc, 3.09% lead, and 97.8 g/t silver in NB23-003.
• 82.5 meters (15 meters true-width) averaging 11.9% zinc, 2.2% lead, and 81.2 g/t silver in NB23-007.
• 44.8 meters (8.5 meters true-width) averaging 8.3% zinc, 1.16% lead, and 42.9 g/t silver in NB23-011.
• 67.8 meters (41 meters true-width) averaging 6.26% zinc, 1.22% lead, and 52 g/t silver in NB23-012.
• 81.3 meters (35 meters true-width) averaging 8.46% zinc, 1.06% lead, and 47 g/t silver in hole NB23-016.
Assays from half of the 52 holes drilled at Boundary during 2023 are pending. The first announcements of 2024 should see the final assays roll in and further outline the extent of mineralization at its latest target.
After finalizing ownership of Mactung, Fireweed set in motion a significant step in any mining project's pipeline, releasing a technical report for an updated mineral resource.
In about a year, from the signing of the initial letter of intent to a definitive asset purchase agreement, then finally an updated MRE, Fireweed wasted no time in catching up the project that had otherwise been collecting dust.
With its timely and thorough work, the latest calculation revealed that Mactung hosts 41.5 million metric tons of indicated underground and open pit resource averaging 0.73% (665 million pounds) tungsten trioxide and 12.3 million metric tons of inferred underground and open pit resource averaging 0.59% (158.7 million lb) tungsten trioxide.
Consolidating past and present data, Mactung quickly rose to a status that firmly places it as the largest high-grade tungsten resource in the world.
In addition to the main tungsten resource, Fireweed also estimated copper and gold as byproduct metals for underground constrained resources only.
According to this calculation, Mactung hosts 12.17 million metric tons of indicated underground resource averaging 0.058% (15.67 million lb) copper, and 0.078 g/t (32,914 oz) gold; and 2.8 million metric tons of inferred underground resource averaging 0.02% (1.2 million lb) copper, and 0.017 g/t (2,194 oz) gold.
Fireweed believes these byproducts could bolster the economics of mining the primary tungsten at Mactung.
A month prior to its acquisition of Mactung in 2022, Fireweed saw potential in another nearby project and moved to acquire it as well.
Approximately 180 kilometers (112 miles) north of Fireweed's Macmillan Pass, Gayna River is located in the Mackenzie Mountains of NWT and within the asserted territory of the Na-Cho Nyäk Dun First Nation.
First discovered in the 1970s, more than 28,000 meters of drilling was carried out by Rio Tinto, which outlined a large target with abundant zinc, lead, and silver mineralization.
Despite this, Rio Tinto allowed the claims to lapse, believing there was low potential for a high-grade deposit at Gayna River.
A recent shift in thinking behind the geological model, however, led Fireweed to believe there is potential for high-grade massive sulfide zones within areas that were not tested by Rio Tinto.
Hence, Fireweed acquired 100% of the Gayna River project at a very low cost by staking an area of 12,875 hectares (31,815 acres), covering all the historic showings and anomalies.
Work in 2023 was primarily conducted to establish a cursory understanding of the property. Soil sampling and geophysical work quickly linked Gayna's geological setting and mineralization to be similar to that of a reef-margin deposit like Ivanho's high-grade Kipushi in the Democratic Republic of Congo in Africa.
While light work has been done at Gayna, initial showings have given Fireweed high expectations for this future zinc property that also shows elevated values for the critical minerals gallium and germanium.
As the remaining results from Macpass roll in, the metallurgical work from five holes drilled at Mactung, the expansion of its camps and facilities, the ongoing sustainability overhaul of its company, and the additions and changes to its corporate structure, Fireweed is more than adequately prepared for 2024 to be another year of expansion and success.
"We continue to demonstrate the enormous scale of mineralization in the Macpass region of eastern Yukon which has emerged now as a truly world-class metallogenic district," said Fireweed Metals Chairman John Robins. "If it wasn't enough that we control Macpass, a 940-square-kilometer land package representing over 50 kilometers of strike prospective for zinc-lead-silver deposits, we have now secured the world's largest high-grade tungsten deposit next-door in Mactung. I am incredibly proud of our team for their tireless work this year at our office, in the field, and the many long days on the road."
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