Prospecting Discovers New Altered Porphyry on the Ootsa property, Assay Results for Hole S18-215 Released

VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Oct. 25, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Surge Copper Corp. (the “Company”) (SURG: TSX-V) is pleased to announce the discovery of a new area containing altered and mineralized porphyry and presents assay results for hole S18-215 from the Company’s Ootsa Property.

The Ootsa Property is an advanced stage copper-gold exploration project containing the East Seel, West Seel, and Ox porphyry deposits, and is located adjacent to the Huckleberry Copper Mine in British Columbia.

HIGHLIGHTS

• Surface exploration has discovered an outcrop of strongly altered porphyry located 4 km southwest of West Seel.
   
• The new discovery has been called the Ravine zone. A single composite grab sample from the Ravine Zone returned 29.1 g/t Ag, 2% Zn and 0.24% Pb.
   
• The Ravine Zone occurs within a 1 kilometre long and open chargeability anomaly that has not been explored previously.
   
• Hole S18-215 intersected long intervals of intense alteration containing highly elevated silver, zinc, and lead including:
   
  • 191.5 metres (to the end of the hole) of 7.25 g/t silver, 0.43% zinc and 0.16% lead.
  • 170 metres of 8.14 g/t silver, 0.49% zinc and 0.17% lead.

Ravine Zone Prospecting
Prospecting 4 kilometres southwest of the West Seel deposit, targeting a large and previously unexplored geophysical anomaly, has resulted in the discovery of a strongly altered quartz-feldspar-biotite porphyry in outcrop.  The porphyry contains strong sericite alteration, is cut by thin quartz-sulfide veinlets, and contains fine grained disseminated sulfides.  A composite grab sample from the porphyry over a 4 metre area returned 29.1 g/t Ag, 2% Zn and 0.24% Pb.  The area corresponds with a 1 kilometre long chargeability anomaly that remains open to the south.  This new area has been termed the Ravine Zone, and the presence of altered mineralized porphyry containing strong alteration and highly anomalous Ag-Zn-Pb associated with a large geophysical anomaly suggests the area has good discovery potential.  Additional work will be planned for the area during 2019 to evaluate the extent and significance of the new zone.

Drill Results
The 2018 drill program at Ootsa focused on expanding existing mineralization and testing new exploration targets around the East and West Seel deposits.  The program has been successful with hole S18-211 (previously released) stepping out and expanding mineralization at East Seel, and holes S18-212 and 214 (previously released) discovering a new zone of copper mineralization east of the East Seel deposit.    

Hole S18-215 is a 100 metre step out to the west of hole S18-214 and was drilled at an azimuth of 135 degrees and a dip of -50 degrees.  The hole intersected highly altered rocks from the start of bedrock at 48 metres to the end of the hole at 351.5 metres.  Assay results from the hole are summarized in the table below.

Summary of select drill intercepts – Hole S18-215

*Width refers to drill hole intercepts, true widths have not been determined.
** Excluding 21.5 metres of unmineralized material within the interval.

Hole S18-215 intersected long intervals of highly anomalous silver, zinc, and lead, including 191.5 metres (to the end of the hole) containing 7.25 g/t silver, 0.43% zinc, and 0.16% lead.   

Drill Program Update
The 2018 Ootsa drilling program is complete and the drill has been demobilized from site.  During 2018 the Company completed 2137 metres of drilling in 7 holes.  A map showing the location of 2018 drill holes is available in the map gallery on our website or by clicking here. 

Results for the final 2 holes of the program, holes S18-216 and 217, are expected shortly.

About Surge Copper Corp. 
The Company owns a 100% interest in the Ootsa Property, an advanced stage exploration project containing the East Seel, West Seel and Ox porphyry deposits located adjacent to the open pit Huckleberry Copper Mine.  The property contains NI 43-101 compliant resources of 224 million tonnes in the Measured and Indicated categories with contained metals of 1.1 billion pounds of copper, 1 million ounces of gold, and 20 million ounces of silver as summarized in the table below. 

On February 9, 2016, the Company announced a positive Preliminary Economic Assessment (PEA) for the Ootsa Property with potential for low capital cost, low risk and rapid pay back utilizing existing infrastructure in the district with a contract mining and toll milling scenario.  The study recommends the Company continue to advance the Ootsa Project with extended and advanced technical studies with the intention of moving the project toward a production decision.

Ootsa Project Pit Constrained Mineral Resource Estimate at $8.50/t NSR Cut-off Value

The current technical report supporting the resource statement and PEA is available on SEDAR or the Company’s website at www.surgecopper.com and has an effective date of January 2016.  The resource estimate uses $8.50 per tonne NSR cut-off value.  Mineral resources are not mineral reserves and by definition do not demonstrate economic viability. There is no certainty that all or any part of the mineral resource will be converted into mineral reserves.  A ‘Measured Mineral Resource’ is that part of a mineral resource for which quantity, grade or quality, densities, shape and physical characteristics are so well established that they can be estimated with confidence sufficient to allow the appropriate application of technical and economic parameters, to support production planning and evaluation of the economic viability of the deposit.   An ‘Indicated Mineral Resource’ is that part of a Mineral Resource for which quantity, grade or quality, densities, shape and physical characteristics can be estimated with a level of confidence sufficient to allow the appropriate application of technical and economic parameters, to support mine planning and evaluation of the economic viability of the deposit.  Copper Equivalent (CuEq) calculations are based on base case metal price (US$3/lb Cu, US$1260/oz Au, US$10.30/lb Mo, and US$17/oz Ag) and process recovery assumptions, and take into account smelter payable rates and refining costs.  M&I = measured and indicated. The resource update and Preliminary Economic Assessment was completed by P&E Mining Consultants Inc. in accordance with National Instrument 43-101 Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects.

Quality Control
All drill core is logged, photographed, and cut in half with a diamond saw.  Half of the core is sealed in plastic bags and sent to Activation Laboratories Ltd. in Kamloops British Columbia for analysis (which is ISO/IEC 17025 accredited), while the other half is archived and stored on site for verification and reference purposes.  Gold is assayed using a 30g fire assay method and 37 additional elements are analyzed by Induced Coupled Plasma (ICP) utilizing a 4-acid digestion.  Duplicate samples, blanks, and certified standards are included with every sample batch and then checked to ensure proper quality assurance and quality control.    

Dr. Shane Ebert P.Geo., is the Qualified Person for the Ootsa project as defined by National Instrument 43-101 and has approved the technical disclosure contained in this news release.

ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS

“Shane Ebert”
President and Chief Executive Officer

For Further information, please contact:
Telephone: 604-718-5454
Toll Free: 888-500-4587
info@surgecopper.com
http://www.surgecopper.com

Or
Don Mosher
Corporate Development
Telephone: 604-685-6465
don@surgecopper.com

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

This News Release contains forward-looking statements, which relate to future events. In some cases, you can identify forward-looking statements by terminology such as "will", "may", "should", "expects", "plans", or "anticipates" or the negative of these terms or other comparable terminology. These statements are only predictions and involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the Company’s actual results, level of activity, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, levels of activity, performance, or achievements expressed or implied by these forward-looking-statements. Such uncertainties and risks may include, among others, actual results of the Company's exploration activities being different than those expected by management, delays in obtaining or failure to obtain required government or other regulatory approvals or financing, inability to procure equipment and supplies in sufficient quantities and on a timely basis, equipment breakdown and bad weather. While these forward-looking statements, and any assumptions upon which they are based, are made in good faith and reflect the Company's current judgment regarding the direction of its business, actual results will almost always vary, sometimes materially, from any estimates, predictions, projections, assumptions or other future performance suggests herein. Except as required by applicable law, the Company does not intend to update any forward-looking statements to conform these statements to actual results.