Starfield cuts high-grade PGE interval (September 30, 2002)

Vancouver — Starfield Resources (SRU-V) has encountered a high-grade platinum-palladium intercept while doing definition drilling on the West zone at its Ferguson Lake nickel-copper project in Nunavut.

Starfield is in the midst of a 22-hole drilling campaign designed to delineating the shallow eastern portion of the West zone in hopes of outlining an open-pit resource. While drilling hole 135, Starfield cut a 1.1-metre low-sulphide zone, which averaged 13.96 grams platinum and 19.13 grams palladium per tonne. It is the thickest zone of platinum and palladium mineralization discovered on the property to date.

Hole 109 cut a similar palladium-rich low-sulphide interval, which graded 56.79 grams palladium and 5.99 grams platinum over a 0.21-metre section.

Hole 134 was drilled 30 metres east of hole 109, and hole 135 was drilled 30 metres west of hold 109.

Hole 135 intersected 8.06 metres averaging 1.01% copper, 0.95% nickel and 0.105% cobalt, plus 1.88 grams palladium and 0.28 gram platinum per tonne, starting at 87.84 metres down-hole.

Farther down-hole, at 100 and 144 metres, the hole cut two intervals that returned low values of copper, nickel and cobalt but averaged higher grades of platinum group elements (PGEs). The first interval cut 2.79 grams palladium and 0.22 gram platinum over 0.84 metre; the second interval cut 2.25 grams palladium and 1.15 grams platinum over 0.78 metre. At a depth of 147.30 metres down-hole, a 1.11-metre section cut 19.13 grams palladium and 13.96 grams platinum.

Hole 134 cut 4.7 metres averaging 1.15% copper, 0.43% nickel, 0.062% cobalt, 0.85 gram palladium and 0.18 gram platinum, starting at 84 metres down-hole. Farther down, at a depth of 92 metres, a 0.51-metre section averaged 1.56% copper, 0.05% nickel, 0.008% cobalt, 0.15 gram palladium and 0.03 gram platinum.

At 108.98 metres down-hole, a 1.17-metre interval cut 0.31% copper, 0.33% nickel, 0.075% cobalt and 3.14 grams palladium and 0.41 gram platinum. This was followed by a 2.28-metre section that averaged 0.41% copper, 0.5% nickel, 0.066% cobalt, 1.95 grams palladium and 1.03 grams platinum starting at 153.87 metres down-hole.

Both holes 134 and 135 contain multiple PGE-enriched low-sulphide intervals, as is also the case in adjacent holes 108, 109 and 111. These multiple intercepts generally occur in the footwall gabbro rocks, sub-parallel to the PGE-enriched massive sulphide units and 30-50 metres below them. The gabbro is variably bleached and hydrothermally altered, containing biotite and chlorite. These high-PGE, low-sulphide intervals exhibit subtle magnetic susceptibility lows, compared with the adjacent host gabbroic rock. Starfield believes this may be a result of iron depletion due to the hydrothermal alteration process of the PGE-mineralizing event.

Moving west to the margin of the West zone, assay results from drill hole 132 indicate the presence of three massive sulphide intervals.

Drill hole 132 was collared from the same drill pad as holes 112 and 119. These holes represent an 800 stepout from last year’s most westerly drilled hole, no. 101. Hole 132 cut 10.55 metres averaging 0.96% copper, 0.83% nickel, 0.117% cobalt, 2.16 grams palladium and 0.36 gram platinum starting at 1,016 metres down-hole, or a vertical depth of 800 metres. This was followed by a 14-metre interval that averaged 1.6% copper, 0.83% nickel, 0.096% cobalt, 2.49 grams palladium and 0.33 gram platinum starting at 1,070 metres down-hole. A third sulphide interval, at 1094.6 metres down-hole, cut 5.32 metres averaging 1.31% copper, 0.66% nickel, 0.074% cobalt, 1.64 grams palladium and 0.17 gram platinum.

These three massive sulphide horizons are about 90 metres updip from the sulphide horizons intersected in hole 02-119, and they exhibit considerable thickening. At the base of the lowest massive sulphide horizon in hole 132, a dyke remobilized local sulphides into a 0.1-metre interval that averaged 19.9% copper, 3.52 grams palladium and 0.45 gram platinum.

Hole 137, collared 400 metres west of hole 132, was recently completed, and is reported to have intersected 6.2 metres of massive sulphides at a depth that is 200 metres stratigraphically higher than the intercepts in hole 132. Hole 139 is now being drilled with the goal of intersecting the zone 150 metres downdip of hole 137.

The West zone hosts an inferred resource of 55.1 million tonnes grading 0.95% copper, 0.59% nickel, 0.065% cobalt, 1.35 grams palladium and 0.23 gram platinum using a cutoff grade of 1% combined copper and nickel. Mineral resources for the eastern (shallower) part of West zone are based mainly on 50 drill holes. The area hosts a resource containing 8 million tonnes grading 1.07% copper, 0.83% nickel, 1.53 grams palladium and 0.2 grams platinum, based on a cutoff grade of 1.5% combined copper-nickel.