The management of Sirios Resources Inc. (TSX-V: SOI) is pleased to report the release of the final set of assay results from the drilling program completed in September 2021 on the Cheechoo gold property, at Eeyou Istchee Baie-James in Quebec. Throughout the program, numerous high-grade gold intervals were intersected, within a large gold envelope showing excellent continuity.

The most significant results from the 6 holes, totaling 1,256 meters, announced today are listed below:

• 2.97 g/t Au over 80.0 m, including 29.13 g/t Au over 5.9 m (CH21-295)
• 1.17 g/t Au over 18.5 m (CH21-295)
• 3.87 g/t Au over 16.0 m, including 23.51 g/t Au over 2.3 m (CH21-296)
• 0.85 g/t Au over 50.4 m (CH21-291)
• 0.72 g/t Au over 35.0 m (CH21-291)
• 1.05 g/t Au over 34.0 m, including 2.51 g/t Au over 11.0 m (CH21-294)
• 0.80 g/t Au over 35.1 m (CH21-293)

The main objective of the 2021 drilling program, which included 32 holes totaling 6,836 meters (Figure 1), was to reduce the drill mesh to 50 meters inside the 2020 conceptual pit shell in order to allow the conversion of a portion of the deposit’s inferred resources to indicated resources in the next resource estimate update.

Figure 1: Cheechoo’s summer 2021 drill holes location. Holes CH21-276, CH21-277 and CH21-278 are located off the map, more than 2 km north of the deposit and did not return significant results: 

https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/43c839d0-e700-4211-afee-1faa76de2e53

Program Highlights

• The 2021 drilling program produced several high-grade intervals within a broad, continuous lower-grade envelope. The continuity of gold mineralization has therefore been confirmed in the central part of the 2020 conceptual pit as well as in the area of the northeast contact of the tonalite with the meta-sedimentary rocks.
• Hole CH21-268 demonstrated the presence of gold mineralization to a vertical depth of more than 500 meters at the tonalite / meta-sediment contact, highlighting the potential to expand the deposit at depth.
• Drill hole CH21-269 confirmed the existence of a new gold bearing zone in a geological context little explored until now, namely in the meta-sediments outside the Cheechoo deposit (ref. press release dated 14/12/2021). This area will require follow-up in the next drilling program.

After review of the full program results, Dominique Doucet, President and CEO of Sirios, said: “These drill holes show how continuous the gold mineralization is within the conceptual pit. This grade continuity is one of the main assets of the Cheechoo deposit, with its low strip ratio, excellent metallurgical recovery and proximity to infrastructure including road and hydroelectric networks. I am therefore very satisfied with all of the 2021 drill results, which confirm our model and increase our confidence in the gold resources of the Cheechoo property. We will now be able to move forward with updating the project’s resource estimate.”

Today’s results are in addition to those previously announced, of which the following are highlights:

The complete 2021 significant assay intervals are presented in the appendix (table 1).

Next steps

In the coming weeks, the Cheechoo deposit model will be updated with results from the 2021 drilling program as well as the 1 kg reassay program. Once this data has been compiled, the update of the Cheechoo project resource estimate will begin. One of the main objectives of this estimate will be the conversion of inferred resources into indicated resources. This conversion could significantly improve the quality of the preliminary economic study (“PEA”) that will be carried out subsequently.

Assay Quality Control

All NQ drill core is logged by Sirios’ personnel at the Cheechoo exploration camp. The drill core is then sent to Rouyn-Noranda to be sawed in half, with one half sent to a commercial laboratory for assaying and other half kept for future reference. A strict QA/QC program is in place by integrating blanks and certified reference standards to the core sample sequence. The samples are assayed for gold by fire assay with an atomic absorption finish by Actlabs. Samples assaying greater than 0.2 g/t Au as well as drill core samples with visible gold are assayed by fire assay with metallic sieve on a 1-kg sample. Special certified reference standards (Assay Pills) were used to ensure adequate quality control of gold assays on 1-kg of material.

The scientific and technical content of this press release has been reviewed and approved by Dominique Doucet, P.Eng. president and CEO of Sirios Resources Inc. and Jordi Turcotte, P.Geo. senior geologist, both qualified persons under National Instrument 43-101.

About the Cheechoo Property

The Cheechoo gold property, wholly-owned by Sirios, is located in Eeyou Istchee James Bay, Quebec, less than 9 km from Newmont’s Eleonore gold mine. The latest resource estimate for the Cheechoo project (October 2020) estimated an inferred resource of 2.0 million ounces of gold contained in 93.0 million tonnes of rock at an average grade of 0.65 g/t Au, with significant potential to increase this resource (BBA, P-L. Richard, P. Geo.; J. Torrealba, P. Eng.; D. Evangelista, P. Eng., NI 43-101 Technical Report, Mineral Resource Estimate Update for The Cheechoo Project, 31/10/2020).

About Sirios

A pioneer in the discovery of significant gold deposits in Eeyou Istchee James Bay, Quebec, Canada, Sirios Resources Inc. is focusing primarily on its Cheechoo gold discovery, while actively exploring the gold potential of its other properties.

APPENDIX

TABLE 1
2021 CHEECHOO SIGNIFICANT ASSAY INTERVALS

A table of drill collar coordinates is available at the following link:

www.sirios.com/bd-coordinates-drilled-20220316.