Slave Lake Zinc Corp. announced that it is actively exploring the O'Connor Lake zinc - lead project located in the South Slave region of the NWT. The Company has progressively advanced its project using a systematic exploration process. Slave Lake Zinc has now compiled results from the recent prospecting undertaken at the O'Connor Lake zinc - lead project. As a result of this new information and interpretation of the project geology, regional setting and structure, the Company is planning a major follow up prospecting and development program for 2023. This season's program was reduced in scale due to a lack of qualified field personnel and a late start. However, the cost-effective exploration during 2022 successfully achieved two main objectives. Trace element geochemistry from the regional scale sampling of quartz vein systems over a distance of approximately eight kilometers confirmed that the wide-spread mineralization is orogenic in nature originating from a deep seated magmatic hydrothermal source. The discovery of a new zinc - lead mineralized zone, approximately 5 kilometers north of the Shaft Zone (News Release October 12, 2022), demonstrates that there appears to be a "structural corridor" trending N-NW hosting mineralization similar to the known deposit; and validates the regional scale deep seated hydrothermal magmatic source model proposed by Dr. B. Prusti (1954). Slave Lake Zinc was originally formed to search for metals deemed essential to the new environmental and technological age. The Federal Government of Canada has designated zinc to be one of the metals critical to Canada's economic security. Zinc is also essential for Canada's transition to a low - carbon economy. The O'Connor Lake project area originally attracted SLZ due to the extensive historic development work of high-grade zinc - lead mineralization prior to 1952 and primarily because no modern exploration has occurred since this time. Vein structures were delineated prior to 1952 with drilling, trench sampling, and underground methods. It is important to note that the South Slave region is underlain by the regional scale Talston Magmatic Zone ("TMZ"). Similar magmatic zones occur worldwide and contain, and produce, significant quantities of a variety of different, essential minerals, including zinc. As a result, Slave Lake Zinc has targeted the O'Connor deposit and the TMZ region as an attractive and underexplored geological environment. Preliminary work by the Company included geophysical grid surveying and sampling of mineralization in the area of the historic work (The "Shaft Zone") and compilation of the historic data. Based on information generated by SLZ, the Company projected a northwest trending "structural corridor" to be controlling the location of mineralization. Additionally, a PhD thesis by Dr. B Prusti (1954) concluded that the mineralization was generated from a deep- seated hydrothermal source. This geological model is consistent with deposition in a structurally deformed regional magmatic zone. The 2022 sampling has allowed SLZ to verify that Shaft Zone type mineralization occurs some 5 kilometers to the N-NW providing significant potential for finding additional economic mineralization along this structural trend. A 900-line km airborne geophysical survey has already been flown over the bulk of the corridor will be released in an upcoming news release. Slave Lake Zinc has recently completed acquisition of a major land position by staking new mineral claims surrounding the Company's original mineral lease established in 2018.
Acquisition of these claims was enabled for Slave Lake Zinc following extensive negotiations in the community of Fort Resolution with the Northwest Territory Metis Nation (NWTMN) council, leading to a formal Collaboration Agreement between the Company and NWTMN. After a complex process lasting over 2 years, the subject lands were made available to SLZ for staking through the lifting of the Interim Land Withdrawal (land dispositions selected for the purposes of settling land claims through federal negotiations) by a Territorial Government Order -in- Council. The interim land withdrawal covers a significant portion of the South Slave Region. The Company selected the new land for staking based on discussions with the NWTMN and on analysis of the information created and compiled by SLZ. Slave Lake Zinc now holds the largest mineral claim assemblage in the South Slave Taltson Magmatic Zone.