Universal Copper Ltd. has completed the 2022 phase I drilling program at the company’s flagship Poplar copper project, located southwest of Houston, B.C.
Apex Diamond Drilling Ltd. completed 1,983 metres in five holes with all the holes being sawn in half top to bottom. Samples have been dispatched to the ALS Minerals prep lab in Kamloops for subsequent analysis at the main ALS Minerals Lab in North Vancouver, an ISO/IEC 17025:2017-accredited facility.
Clive Massey, Universal Copper’s chief executive officer and president, commented: “The company is very pleased with the drill program as we focused on a number of targets: expanding on the 0.546 per cent copper over 129 metres discovered in the bottom of 21-PC-135, expanding the higher grade portion of the known mineralization to the northwest and testing the first of the vector geological solutions targets identified from their early 2022 targeted core logging initiative we announced on Jan. 13.”
One of the holes was lost at 111 metres, well short of the target, resulting in a total of five holes for the program as opposed to the planned four holes. Assay results will be released once they have been received and reviewed by the company’s technical team.
Quality assurance/quality control measures, chain of custody
The entire length of core for all holes was sawn and sampled at continuous three-metre or less intervals, with a few samples taken at shorter or longer intervals based on apparent lithological, alteration or mineralization contacts. The program was supervised by independent geologist Ray Wladichuk, PGeo. One-half of the core for each sample interval was bagged and sealed with a zap strap, with the other half of the core retained in a secure storage location. The series of sequentially numbered samples were confirmed and placed in a sequentially numberered rice bag. Certified reference standards, a certified reference blank and sample duplicates were placed in the sample stream of each drill hole alternating at every 10th to 18th interval. The rice bags were sealed and securely stored until the entire hole was sampled. At the conclusion of sampling of each hole, the secured and sealed rice bags were turned over to the local trucking company for transport to the ALS Minerals prep lab in Kamloops, B.C., for later analysis at the ALS Mineral Laboratory in North Vancouver, B.C. The North Vancouver lab holds an ISO/IEC 17025:2005 accreditation.
All core samples will be analyzed utilizing ALS’s MEICP-61 procedure, a four-acid digestion of a one-gram sample with an inductively coupled plasma finish. All core samples will also be analyzed utilizing ALS’s Au-ICP21 procedure, a 30-gram gold fire assay with an ICP-AES (atomic emission spectroscopy) finish. Overlimits will be reanalyzed utilizing ALS’s OG-62 procedure, an ICP-AES four-acid procedure.
In addition to Universal’s third party standards, a routine quality assurance/quality control procedure will monitor the analytical quality at the lab. Certified reference materials (CRMs), pulp duplicates and blanks will be inserted into each lab batch of samples.
Qualified person
The technical content of this new release has been reviewed and approved by R. Tim Henneberry, PGeo (B.C.), a member of the company’s advisory board and a qualified person under National Instrument 43-101.
About Poplar
The 61,600-hectare Poplar project hosts a current undiluted indicated mineral resource of 152.3 million tonnes grading 0.32 per cent copper, 0.009 per cent molybdenum, 0.09 gram per tonne gold and 2.58 g/t silver and an undiluted inferred mineral resource of 139.3 million tonnes grading 0.29 per cent copper, 0.005 per cent molybdenum, 0.07 g/t gold and 4.95 g/t silver. The mineral resource estimate has a cut-off grade of 0.20 per cent copper. Universal Copper cautions investors mineral resources, which are not mineral reserves, do not have demonstrated economic viability.
Poplar lies in an historic mining region, located 35 kilometres from the Huckleberry mine and 42 km from Equity silver mine, where low snowfalls will allow year-round work. The road accessible property is bisected by a 138,000-volt hydroelectric line and lies 88 km from Houston and 400 km from the deep-water port at Prince Rupert by rail.
About Universal Copper Ltd.
Universal Copper is a Canadian-based copper exploration company focused on the acquisition and exploration of copper properties. The company’s management team has many years of experience in exploration, finance and efficient public company management. Universal’s current focus is on advancing the Poplar copper project, one of the most advanced preproduction copper projects in British Columbia with a historic NI 43-101 resource.
