Testing The High-Priority Campfire Target Complex

VANCOUVER – Westward Gold Inc. reported on its 2025 drilling campaign, currently underway at its flagship Toiyabe Hills Property in Lander County, Nevada. Westward is testing its high-priority Campfire Target Complex with approximately 5,000 metres (~16,500 feet) of reverse-circulation (RC) drilling. To date, three holes have been completed (combined depth of 2,251 m) with samples for the first two sent for gold and multi-element analysis (CF25-03 samples are awaiting imminent delivery). CF25-02 was selected as the first hole to undergo detailed logging of RC chips and is described in further detail herein. Hole CF25-04 was recently initiated and drilling at a depth of 244m.
Lessons learned during the drilling of CF25-01 enabled the Company to push CF25-02 and CF25-03 to significant depths; as a result, CF25-02 became the first hole ever at Toiyabe Hills to test the Roberts Mountains Formation, an important gold-hosting horizon at nearby mines and major deposits. Based on detailed logging of RC chips, the contact between the Roberts Mountains and the Wenban Formation was estimated at approximately 1,840’ / 560m depth. With CF25-02, the extensive decalcification mapped at surface is now confirmed down-section in both the Wenban and Roberts Mountains Formations – with 13 logged intervals of moderate to strongly-decalcified lower-plate rocks ranging in thickness from 20’ (6.1m) to 310’ (94.5m). The Company also observed eight zones of intrusive rocks, confirming that the intermediate to mafic (lamprophyre) dikes observed at surface are also present at depth in CF25-02.
Steven Koehler, Technical Advisor, said, “The 2024 Anaconda-style geological mapping provided much-needed surface information regarding the hydrothermal system, structure and host rocks – the three critical ingredients required for a compelling gold target at Toiyabe Hills. Mapping identified the northeast-plunging, igneous dike-filled Campfire Anticline and a variety of stratigraphic and structural target opportunities – the Campfire Target Complex – in the anticline. Westward’s 2025 Phase 1 drilling campaign began at the up-plunge expression of the anticline, where surface exposures of decalcified Wenban Formation limestone crop out. Drill hole CF25-02 intersected multiple zones of altered igneous dikes and vertically-extensive zones of decalcification at depth in the favorable Wenban and Roberts Mountains Formations. It’s a rare day in Nevada to confirm these downhole geological patterns in an underexplored gold system so close to the major Cortez camp. Drilling to date reinforces my confidence in our initial interpretations that Campfire is an expansive Carlin-type hydrothermal system both in plan and in the third dimension at depth.”
Based on detailed logging, the Company has interpreted that CF25-02 was near the Roberts Mountains / Hanson Creek formational contact when the hole was completed. This interpretation was supported by i) a distinct increase in dolomite content as the hole approached its ultimate depth, and ii) the documented thickness of the Roberts Mountains Formation in the district. CF25-03, the first hole of the program to test the down-plunge expression of the Campfire Anticline where it intersects coincident geophysical anomalies, was collared in upper-plate siliciclastic rocks. Based on preliminary logging at the drill rig, Westward estimates that the hole pierced into the Wenban Formation at a depth of 1,005’ / 306m. This represents a significant positive development in the early stages of the campaign: confirmation that lower-plate host rock strata can routinely be reached with RC drilling across the Campfire Complex, and moreover – over a large extent of the ~61 square kilometer Property as a whole. This also effectively demonstrates that surface anomalies observed in upper-plate rocks can be chased at depth into favourable carbonate rocks with relative ease.