Copper Road Resources Commences Summer 2023 Diamond Drilling Program in Batchewana Bay, Ontario

TORONTO, Aug. 21, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Copper Road Resources Inc. (TSXV: CRD) (“Copper Road” or the “Company”) is pleased to announce that the 2023 drill program has commenced at the highly-prospective JR Zone at its Copper Road Project in Batchewana Bay, Ontario. The current drill campaign is designed to demonstrate that the JR Zone hosts a shallow mineralized porphyry and high-grade breccia in the centre of the Company’s district-scale land package that hosts two past-producing copper mines.

The JR Zone, comprising the Jogran Porphyry and nearby Richards Breccia (see Figure 1), is located approximately 12 km from the former Tribag Mine Zone which the Company drilled in 2022 (see press release dated October 13, 2022). Copper Road has previously completed Mobile Metal Ion (“MMI”) soil sampling and digitization of historical geophysical surveys at the JR Zone (Jogran-Richards) and has determined the 1.5km x 800m area is prospective for the discovery of additional copper mineralization (see Figure 2).

Figure 1. JR Zone MM Lines and Proposed DDHs

Figure 2. JR Zone Long Section

The 2023 summer diamond drilling program, totalling 1,000 metres, is the first step in proving the JR Zone as a large-scale zone of economic copper mineralization at shallow depths. 

John Timmons, President & CEO of Copper Road, comments:

 “We are excited about the prospect of identifying an additional large-scale near-surface zone of Cu/Mo/Ag/Au mineralization in the heart of our 21,000-hectare project. Jurisdiction is becoming increasingly important in the modern quest for critical minerals, and our district-scale property in Sault St. Marie, 20 km from the TransCanada Highway checks all the boxes. 

There have been very few new shallow copper discoveries in Tier-1 jurisdictions in the past decade. Given the potential large scale of the JR Zone, Copper Road is poised to unlock significant value for shareholders, and we look forward to the results from the summer program.”

The Company is currently drilling the following priority targets at the JR Zone:

• J-P-23-01: the hole will test the Jogran porphyry at depth proximal to historical DDHs from 1964: JDH-13 (5 to 152 m: 147 m @ 0.27% Cu, 0.068% MoS₂, 0.53% Cu Eq) and JDH-16 (5 to 170 m: 165m @ 0.23% Cu, 0.054% MoS₂, 0.43% Cu Eq), neither of which were assayed for potential by-product metals (e.g. Au, Ag, Re, W). The hole will be designed to test the porphyry mineralization to a vertical depth of 400 m which is approximately twice the extent of known mineralization.
• R-P-23-01: the hole will test the extension of the historic high-grade intercepts in the Richards Breccia by stepping out approximately 50 m to the west of AR98-07 (27 m @ 1.46% Cu, 0.17 g/t Au, 3.8 g/t Ag) at a vertical depth of approximately 50 m. The Company interprets the high-grade mineralization to follow the perimeter of the breccia pipe similar to the Breton Breccia, Tribag Mine Zone. This is supported by the semi-circular geometry of the Gradient IP anomaly associated with the Richards Breccia (see Figure 3).

Figure 3. JR Zone Gradient IP