North of 60 Mining News - The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North

Blue Star Gold Corp. Feb. 15 announced the final results from the 2021 exploration program at its Ulu project located in the High Lake Greenstone belt in Nunavut, Canada.

According to a 2015 calculation, the Flood and Gnu zones on the Ulu property host 2.5 million metric tons of measured and indicated resources averaging 7.53 grams per metric ton (605,000 ounces) gold; and 1.26 million metric tons of inferred resource grading 5.57 g/t (226,000 oz) gold.

The larger Hood River property hosts 22 known gold occurrences and is prospective for shear-hosted gold mineralization similar to the Flood zone, which hosts the bulk of the resource on the adjacent Ulu property.

"Blue Star has numerous very prospective target zones throughout its extensive landholdings that have seen only limited modern-day exploration as most of the focus historically has been on delineating our high-grade Flood zone gold deposit," said Blue Star Gold CEO Grant Ewing. "The addition of the Roma project in 2021 and the discovery of a new vein system at the Gnu zone, represents a different style of gold mineralization from that of the Flood zone deposit, adds to our potential for further new discoveries and resource growth."

During 2021, Blue Star completed 5,012 meters of drilling testing 11 targets in six zones. Most of this drilling tested targets in the area of the Flood zone gold deposit, as well as along the Ulu fold hinge that extends roughly 5,000 meters north to the North Fold Nose (NFN) zone on the adjacent Hood River property.

As the largest stakeholder along the High Lake Greenstone belt, Blue Star's Ulu, Hood River and Roma projects cover more than 40 high-grade gold occurrences over a 50-kilometer (31 mile) strike, with a majority of the two former projects being largely underexplored.

Having begun the 2021 exploration in June with a geophysics campaign, followed shortly after by a drill campaign and surface exploration program, the company successfully completed all its planned phases by September.

The exploration campaign evaluated several high priority targets near the known high-grade Flood zone gold deposit on Ulu, with objectives including a better understanding of the controls of higher-grade zones within the hosting structures, evaluation of additional structures on and adjacent to the Ulu fold hinge and defining additional targets for potential near-term discovery.

"The 2021 exploration program successfully delivered several gold intersections in different zones on our projects and upgraded and expanded Blue Star's extensive target pipeline," added Ewing.

Toward the end of its campaign last year, Blue Star enlisted the expertise of artificial intelligence mineral exploration company GoldSpot Discoveries Corp. to leverage its proprietary machine learning approach on the projects that have remained relatively unexplored, mainly Hood River and Roma, to provide new, smart targets.

You can read more about Blue Star and GoldSpot's collaboration at GoldSpot in high demand for AI exploration in the September 22, 2021 edition of Metal Tech News – https://www.metaltechnews.com/story/2021/09/22/mining-tech/goldspot-in-high-demand-for-ai-exploration/713.html.

"With the release of the 2021 program assay data, we now have a better understanding of the geochemical and structural controls on our projects," said Ewing. "We continue to unravel the structural architecture and develop improved targeting techniques, and the team is excited to test these concepts in our upcoming 2022 exploration program."

Highlights of the 2021 drill program are:

• Shallow Flood zone hole 21BSG025 returned an interval of 4.65 meters of 5.8 g/t gold.

• Additional sampling of historic hole 04UL-02 revised an interval to 26.35 meters of 3.36 g/t gold by sampling between previously modeled higher grade and lower grade mineralized lenses.

• North Fold Nose east limb hole 21BSG017 returned 2.05 meters of 10.1 g/t gold, including 1.13 meters of 11.35 g/t gold.

• Gnu zone hole 21BSG020, a follow-up hole to 21BSG007, returned 5.34 meters of 3.72 g/t gold, including 0.83 meters of 12.95 g/t gold.

• Regional sampling highlights include: 21BSG007 intersected 8.15 meters of 20.80 g/t gold in a new vein system in the Gnu area; 21BSG001 returned 4.91 meters of 19.10 g/t gold and 7 meters of 6.9 g/t gold in Flood Zone lenses; 21BSG002 returned 2.64 meters of 13 g/t gold in the Flood Zone – expanded high grade core; and 21BSG006 returned 2.18 meters of 11.06 g/t gold, following up on drill hole BS2020ULU-007, which returned 2 meters of 52.7 g/t gold from the Gnu zone.

Initial proposals and planning are already underway for Blue Star's 2022 exploration program and currently has envisioned a balanced approach that targets adding new ounces around recent successes such as those from the Gnu zone; drill testing high priority targets from the 2021 program that did not get tested, such as Zebra and Contact, where historic drilling returned significant results; evaluating the regional land package for targets that can immediately impact the program, such as Twilight and Roma Main; move targets along its heavily weighted early-stage target pipeline to the drill testing stage; and to investigate further and reassess unsampled historic core.

"The 2022 exploration program is in the initial review and planning stage with timing for execution anticipated to start with the camp opening in mid-May, drilling in mid-June and additional field activities in mid-July," explained Vice President of Exploration Darren Lindsay in a recent Q&A.

The program is expected to include regional geophysical and geochemical surveys and select mapping and prospecting over areas that have been identified as highly prospective for new discovery.