Mr. Peeyush Varshney reports
CANADA ZINC METALS ANNOUNCES COMPLETION OF INITIAL EARN-IN ON THE PIE OPTION PROPERTIES
Teck Resources Ltd. and Korea Zinc Co. Ltd. have delivered to Canada Zinc Metals Corp. an exercise notice regarding the optionees' first option on the Pie, Yuen and Cirque East properties.
Background
The Pie, Yuen and Cirque East properties are the subject of an option agreement concluded on Sept. 9, 2013, with Teck and partner, Korea Zinc. The option agreement would see Teck and Korea Zinc spend up to $8.5-million to acquire up to 70-per-cent interest in the Pie option properties in two phases.
The agreement outlines two options that are subject to certain expenditure requirements, as outlined below:
Under the first option, Teck/Korea Zinc can earn an undivided 51-per-cent interest in and to the property by incurring a cumulative aggregate of $3.5-milion in exploration expenditures on the property on or before Dec. 31, 2017. Under the second option, Teck/Korea Zinc may elect to acquire an additional 19-per-cent interest in the property for a total of 70 per cent, by incurring an additional $5-million in exploration expenditures (for a total aggregate of $8.5-million in exploration expenditures) on the property on or before Dec. 31, 2019.
First exercise notice
Teck has served the first exercise notice confirming that the optionees have incurred cumulative aggregate expenditures of $3.5-million by Dec. 31, 2017 (or made a cash payment to the company for any shortfall), thereby exercising the first option and earning a 51-per-cent interest in the company's Pie, Cirque East and Yuen properties, three of the 10 regional properties that make up Canada Zinc's Kechika regional project.
Exploration work thus far includes airborne geophysics, soil sampling, mapping, rock sampling and ground geophysics that have continued to advance and refine ranked drill targets across the three option properties. A single drill hole was completed late in the 2016 field season on the Pie property that encountered favourable Gunsteel shale stratigraphy approximately one kilometre west of previous historical drilling on the Pie Main prospect. The exploration program was based out of Teck's Cirque exploration camp located approximately 20 kilometres northwest of the company's flagship Akie property.
About the optioned properties
The Yuen, Cirque East and Pie properties surround Teck/Korea Zinc's jointly owned Cirque deposit to the north and east, and provide extensive coverage of the highly prospective Gunsteel formation shale that is the known host rocks for sedex (sedimentary exhalative) Zn-Pb-Ag (zinc-lead-silver) deposits in the Kechika trough including the company's Cardiac Creek deposit, located 22 kilometres south on the Akie property.
The Akie Zn-Pb-Ag project
The company's 100-per-cent-owned flagship Akie property is situated within the Kechika trough, the southernmost area of the regionally extensive Paleozoic Selwyn basin, one of the most prolific sedimentary basins in the world for the occurrence of sedex (sedimentary exhalative) zinc-lead-silver and stratiform barite deposits.
Drilling on the Akie property by Canada Zinc Metals since 2005 has identified a significant body of baritic-zinc-lead-silver sedex mineralization known as the Cardiac Creek deposit. The deposit is hosted by siliceous, carbonaceous, fine-grained clastic rocks of the middle-to-late-Devonian Gunsteel formation.
The company has outlined a National Instrument 43-101-compliant mineral resource at Cardiac Creek, including an indicated resource of 19.6 million tonnes grading 8.2 per cent zinc, 1.6 per cent lead and 13.6 g/t silver (at a 5-per-cent-zinc cut-off grade) and an inferred resource of 8.1 million tonnes grading 6.8 per cent zinc, 1.1 per cent lead and 11.2 g/t silver (at a 5-per-cent-zinc cut-off grade).
In addition to the Akie project, the company owns 100 per cent of 10 large, contiguous property blocks that comprise the Kechika Regional project. The Kechika Regional project includes the Pie, Yuen, Cirque East and Mount Alcock properties, extending northwest from the Akie property for approximately 140 kilometres along strike of the highly prospective Gunsteel formation shale -- the main host rock for known sedex zinc-lead-silver deposits in the Kechika trough of northeastern British Columbia. These projects are located approximately 260 kilometres north-northwest of the town of Mackenzie, B.C.
Ken MacDonald, PGeo, vice-president of exploration, is the designated qualified person as defined by National Instrument 43-101 and is responsible for the technical information contained in this release.
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