New Found Gold Corp. announced the results from 46 diamond drill holes that were completed as part of a drill program designed to test the Keats West Zone and follow-up on new gold mineralization identified at the Cokes Zone through reconnaissance and targeted drilling. Both prospects are located on the west side of the highly prospective Appleton Fault Zone (?AFZ?).

New Found?s 100%-owned Queensway project comprises a 1,662km2 area, accessible via the Trans-Canada Highway, 15km west of Gander, Newfoundland and Labrador. Three of today?s highlight intervals were drilled into the westernmost extent of the Keats West zone, intercepting 3.49 g/t Au over 23.20m in NFGC-23-1765, 12.8 g/t Au over 3.30m in NFGC-23-1745, and 16.9 g/t Au over 2.15m in NFGC-23-1755. All three holes hit the structure shallowly starting between 2m and 35m vertical depth, indicating strong near-surface continuity of high-grade gold mineralization over a strike length of 315m at Keats West.

Further east, within the Keats West structure, additional results have been received from holes that were designed to test gaps left from the previous drilling campaign. Several thick intervals of high-grade mineralization were intercepted including the highlight intervals 3.20 g/t Au over 43.80m in NFGC-23-1708, 10.3 g/t Au over 13.00m, and 3.22 g/t Au over 23.50m in NFGC-23-1741, and 2.97 g/t Au over 23.00m in NFGC-23-1713. Gold mineralization at Keats West is hosted by a low-angle thrust fault that dips gently to the south-southwest and has a drill-defined mineralized footprint spanning 305m long by 315m wide and starts at surface with all intercepts drilled to date occurring above 130m vertical depth.

The zone has a cumulative average thickness of 30m. At Cokes, a historic showing located 300m southwest of Keats West on the west side of the AFZ, drilling has successfully expanded upon the mineralized zone through a combination of grid and targeted drilling. A first-pass program conducted by New Found in 2021 returned encouraging results at Cokes including the highlight interval of 2.40 g/t over 23.70m in NFGC-21-157.

Today?s results expand the mineralized footprint at Cokes and define a low-angle and south-dipping gold mineralized structure that is very similar in orientation to the nearby Keats West. Several significant intervals were received including 4.33 g/t Au over 11.80m in NFGC-23-1891, 2.75 g/t Au over 13.50m in NFGC-23-1609, 3.64 g/t Au over 7.90m, 2.54 g/t Au over 8.55m and 1.76 g/t Au over 11.10m in NFGC-23-1870 that together span a domain 65m wide by 90m long. Additional drilling is required to understand the mineralizing controls in this area and to expand on this new discovery.

The Company is currently undertaking a 650,000m drill program at Queensway and approximately 2,100m of core is currently pending assay results. All drilling recovers HQ core. Drill core is split in half using a diamond saw or a hydraulic splitter for rare intersections with incompetent core.

A geologist examines the drill core and marks out the intervals to be sampled and the cutting line. Sample lengths are mostly 1.0 meter and adjusted to respect lithological and/or mineralogical contacts and isolate narrow (<1.0m) veins or other structures that may yield higher grades. Technicians saw the core along the defined cutting line.

One-half of the core is kept as a witness sample and the other half is submitted for analysis. Individual sample bags are sealed and placed into totes, which are then sealed and marked with the contents. New Found has submitted samples for gold determination by fire assay to ALS Canada Ltd. (?ALS?) and by photon assay to MSALABS (?MSA?) since June 2022.

ALS and MSA operate under a commercial contract with New Found. Drill core samples are shipped to ALS for sample preparation in Sudbury, Ontario, Thunder Bay, Ontario, or Moncton, New Brunswick. ALS is an ISO-17025 accredited laboratory for the fire assay method.

Drill core samples are also submitted to MSA in Val-d?Or, Quebec. MSA operates numerous laboratories worldwide and maintains ISO-17025 accreditation for many metal determination methods. MSA is an ISO-17025 accredited laboratory for the photon assay method.

At ALS, the entire sample is crushed to approximately 70% passing 2mm. A 3,000-g split is pulverized. ?Routine?

samples do not have visible gold (VG) identified and are not within a mineralized zone. Routine samples are assayed for gold by 30-g fire assay with an inductively-couple plasma spectrometry (ICP) finish. If the initial 30-g fire assay gold result is over 1 g/t, the remainder of the 3,000-g split is screened at 106 microns for screened metallics assay.

For the screened metallics assay, the entire coarse fraction (sized greater than 106 microns) is fire assayed and two splits of the fine fraction (sized less than 106 microns) are fire assayed. The three assays are combined on a weight-averaged basis. Samples that have VG identified or fall within a mineralized interval are automatically submitted for screened metallic assay for gold.