お知らせ • Mar 06
First Mining Gold Corp. Provides Update on 2025 Exploration Program At the Duparquet Gold Project and Mobilizes First Drilling Rig
First Mining Gold Corp. announced its 2025 exploration programs at the Duparquet Gold Project located in the Abitibi region of Quebec, Canada. The 2025 program at the Duparquet Project will be the largest exploration drill program undertaken by the Company since acquiring full ownership of the Project in 2022. First Mining will aim to complete an approximate 18,000 m of exploration drilling this year, focusing on advancing priority targets that are aligned to resource growth potential which will further unlock an important regional gold endowment supportive of future development optionality at the Duparquet Project. The program is built upon key target centres that the Company has previously identified and significantly de-risked, for an expansion of internal successes and recent discoveries while also pursuing new regional exploration opportunities. The Company commenced its maiden drill program at the Duparquet Project in May 2023. Over the last two years, First Mining has completed approximately 20,000 m of exploration drilling combined with significant updated geoscience modelling and targeting. The exploration strategy continues to be guided by further advancing resource confidence, as well as developing extension and discovery-level targets spanning the approximately 5,800 hectare mineral tenure which covers a 19 km strike length of the highly prospective Destor-Porcupine Fault Zone ("DPFZ"). Initial drill rig mobilization to the property will commence during the first week of March 2025. Highlights from the last three phases of drilling programs include the unlocking of new discovery zones at Miroir, Aiguille (2024) and Buzz (2023), successfully demonstrating resource extensional targets along strike and at depth (Valentre, North Zone, DCD and East Extension), as well as delineating higher-grade zones within key mineralization areas (CDHG, Valentre and North Zone). In addition, new favourable host lithologies and structures were identified, with significant results returned within mafic volcanic units to the north of the main resource at the North Zone and Miroir targets, and similarly from the south at the Buzz and Aiguille targets, which are hosted in brecciated units in contact with sediments. The 2025 exploration drilling program and target selection is supported by a robust geoscience foundation and a comprehensive target catalogue. This framework has been refined through two years of exploration activities, including a property-wide, high-resolution airborne geophysical and LiDAR survey. Additionally, a two-phase 3D Leapfrog geological model update was completed, integrating key geological features across the entire mineral tenure. The Company also conducted two summer field prospecting and mapping campaigns to further advance and refine regional targets. The exploration program will commence in March 2025 with the Phase 3B winter program, starting with one drill rig and targeting approximately 3,000 m of drilling. The first target of the program will be at the recent discovery zone, Miroir, after which further extensional opportunities at the Central Duparquet-Valentre-Dumico ("CVD") and East Extension ("EEXT") targets will be drill tested, concluding with the drill testing of a regional exploration target. The 2025 exploration outlook for the Company is to continue to demonstrate that the Duparquet Project has significant exploration potential and that a geoscience systems approach to exploration strategy execution can unlock further value for the Project, which is underpinned by a meaningful resource foundation. The 2025 exploration programs at the Duparquet Project will be focused on further defining and characterizing the controls on mineralization, as well as drill testing the extent of the mineralization at the newly discovered Miroir and Aiguille targets and further advancing and testing up to four resource expansion targets at depth and along strike. The First Mining exploration teams have been focusing on updating target models with data from the 2024 drilling and field programs, and by integrating the latest results into the multi-layered geoscience data model, have further delineated key zones for resource expansion and discovery potential. The North Zone is a priority drilling area for the Company, and the aim is to target higher-grade zones at depth and below the existing mineral resource. The North Zone returned multiple significant intercepts in drill hole DUP24-024 and this hole, as well as subsequent holes drilled in 2024, supports and demonstrates that there is a secondary higher-grade control on the mineralization on the northern contact of the main deposit which will be the targeting priority for depth extension targets. The CVD target area has evolved significantly over the last two years of drilling and the Company has drill tested a 175 m strike target (Valentre) and demonstrated the continuity in mineralization with 142 unique mineralized intercepts in 16 drill holes. The focus of the 2025 follow-up programs at the CVD area is to extend the mineralization at depth, drill test the higher-grade zones delineated and ensure the target area is drilled to a confidence level sufficient for incorporation into a future resource model update. The Donchester Central Duparquet Zone ("DCD") drilling strategy was focused on potential resource expansion along strike towards the eastern edge of the North and South Zones. Gold mineralization encountered at the DCD Zone consists of brecciated silica-altered basalt units, with up to 5% fine-grained to very fine-grained disseminated pyrite mineralization. The EEXT drilling strategy was focused on potential resource expansion along the eastern strike extent of the historical Dumico resource area. The EEXT drilling intersected gold mineralization hosted within silica- and sericite-altered rhyolite units, with up to 5% fine-grained to medium-grained disseminated pyrite and stringers of quartz carbonate veining. The exploration drilling at the DCD and EEXT Zones was successful in intersecting mineralization along strike of the existing mineral resource. Follow-up exploration along these target zones will aim to further validate and delineate the controls on the mineralization and results from the recent drilling of these and other targets on the property will be incorporated into an updated target model to vector towards broader and higher-grade gold zones.