Surge Copper Corp. announced that it has commenced its 2023 field exploration program which is anticipated to run during the summer months of 2023 and include both diamond drilling at the Berg deposit and surface exploration at multiple target areas throughout the Berg-Ootsa district. Drilling at the Berg deposit is anticipated to commence the week of July 17 and the Company is looking to complete 6 to 8 core holes for up to 3,500 metres of drilling.

The Berg deposit contains multiple areas where additional drilling has potential to expand zones of higher grade mineralization both latterally and vertically. The 2023 drill program will have multiple objectives including grade expansion, providing additional material for metallurgical testwork, filling in precious metal gaps in the deposit, increasing geotechnical knowledge, and converting a portion of Inferred resources to Measured and Indicated. The Company plans to drill larger diameter HQ size drill core (63.5mm diameter) near surface through the higher-grade supergene chalcocite blanket and reduce to NQ2 size core (50.6mm diameter) at depth.

Planned holes will be 300 to 600 metres in depth, with a deeper hole up to 900 metres deep being contemplated to evaluate the deep potential of the deposit. To date the Company has completed over 2,300 soil samples during 2023 from across the Berg and Ootsa properties along with mapping and rock sampling over select target areas. New copper-in-soil anomalies and new zones of alteration and veining have been identified and are being advanced and evaluated.

To date this low cost surface work has focused on low elevation targets across the Berg and Ootsa properties, in mid-July and August surface explortation will shift to focus on high elevation areas near the Berg deposit. During 2023 field crews have completed 786 soil samples in and around the East Sibola Target designed to fully define the known copper-in-soil zone and evaluate the surrounding area. The 2023 sampling has significantly expanded and defined the anomaly which is now 1.5 kilometres long by around 300 metres wide and contains both elevated copper and molybdenum.

The anomaly occurs within a till covered area and contains copper values up to 225 parts per million, which the Company considers to be strongly anomalous for a till covered area. The southwest side of the anomaly overlaps with a partially defined induced polarization chargeability anomaly further supporting the target. Additional mapping and prospecting of an incised creek draingage immediately south of the anomaly has expanded a known zone of alteration and sulfide mineralization.

Surge geologists have mapped the zone which contains approximately 50 metres of semi-continuous disseminated sulfide mineralization, including pyrite and chalcopyrite. The exposed mineralization occurs along a steep canyon with a fast moving creek and will be chip sampled once water levels are low enough to allow safe access. Drilling in 2022, about 1 kilometre southwest of the copper-in-soil anomaly, combined with historic exploration work across the Sibola to East Sibola area has documented widespread alteration and intrusive rocks indicating a setting favorable for porphyry syle mineralization.

East Sibola is developing into a high quality exploration target and the Company plans to complete surface exploration over the zone in 2023 to allow a near term drilling decision. Soil samples were analyzed in the field by portable X-ray fluorescence (pXRF) with analysis completed through thin plastic sandwich bags on the fine fraction of dried soil samples within an enclosed XRF workstation using an Olympus Innov-X Delta series pXRF unit equipped with a 4 W 40 kV Xray Tube and an Rh anode excitation source. Samples were analyzed using the factory set soil mode utilizing 3 beams, with a 105 second run time.

Approximately 15% of the samples analyzed were quality control samples consisting of standards, blanks, and duplicates.