Metals Creek and Benton Expand Smoking Gun Hydrogen-Helium Project Ahead of First Drill Program

Metals Creek Resources and Benton Resources have expanded their Smoking Gun Hydrogen-Helium Project in western Newfoundland, adding 262 claim units through staking as the partners await results from a recently completed regional soil-gas exploration program. 

The additional ground expands the companies’ position within the Deer Lake Basin, one of two sedimentary basins in western Newfoundland where Metals Creek and Benton are evaluating the potential for naturally occurring hydrogen and helium. 

The expansion comes shortly after completion of soil-gas programs at both the Smoking Gun Project in the Deer Lake Basin and the Parson’s Pond Project in the Parson’s Pond Basin. 

Those surveys were overseen by Rudy Willick of Saskatchewan-based Rudiger Re-Chem and represent an important targeting stage ahead of the companies’ planned first drilling campaign. 

Metals Creek and Benton intend to compile and interpret the soil-gas results before selecting favourable hydrogen and helium targets for an inaugural drill program. 

That sequencing puts the current work firmly in the target-generation phase. The companies are using surface geochemistry and regional geology to determine where subsurface testing should be prioritized rather than moving directly into drilling. 

The exploration thesis is based on several geological ingredients the partners believe could support both hydrogen generation and gas accumulation. 

Both the Deer Lake and Parson’s Pond basins contain porous sandstone and conglomerate units associated with mudstones and shales. The companies interpret the more porous formations as potential reservoir rocks, with the finer-grained units potentially providing seals capable of trapping migrating gases. 

The hydrogen component of the model also incorporates the presence of chrome and serpentine-bearing rocks together with groundwater. Metals Creek and Benton believe these geological conditions could provide a mechanism for natural hydrogen generation. 

Regional fault structures provide another component of the exploration concept, potentially creating pathways through which hydrogen or helium generated or sourced at depth could migrate toward structural traps within the sedimentary sequence. 

The location map released with the announcement illustrates the expanded Smoking Gun land position within the Deer Lake Basin and the scale of the additional claims being incorporated into the project. 

For the companies, the attraction is therefore not based on a single geological feature but on the potential combination of hydrogen-generating rocks, groundwater interaction, migration structures, porous reservoirs and overlying sealing formations. 

Both basins remain underexplored for natural hydrogen and helium, however, and the companies have cautioned that indications of gas or methane on their properties — or gas discoveries on neighbouring ground — do not establish the presence of hydrogen or helium within their projects. 

That makes the outstanding soil-gas results particularly important: if the surveys identify coherent hydrogen or helium anomalies that can be correlated with favourable structures and geology, Metals Creek and Benton intend to use those results to prioritize locations for subsurface testing. 

The addition of another 262 claim units at Smoking Gun therefore comes as the exploration strategy begins moving toward a more consequential stage. 

The immediate catalyst is the soil-gas data. The larger question that follows is whether those results can provide Metals Creek and Benton with sufficiently compelling targets to launch their first hydrogen and helium drilling program in western Newfoundland. 

Full press release is attached:

Thunder Bay Ontario, September 03, 2026, - Metals Creek Resources Corp. (the “Companies” or “Metals Creek”, TSXV: MEK, OTC Pink: MCREF, FRA:M1C1) and Benton Resources Inc.  (the “Companies” or “Benton”, TSXV: BEX) announces that it has acquired an addition 262 claim units thru staking (See Figure 1) expanding the Smoking Gun Hydrogen/Helium Project in the Deer Lake Basin. The Companies are currently awaiting results from the recently completed (See News Release: August 18, 2026) soil gas program. This program entailed two regional soil gas programs at Parson's Pond and Smoking Gun Hydrogen-Helium projects. Rudy Willick of Rudiger Re-Chem from Neuanlage, Saskatchewan oversaw the execution and implementation of these programs. The Companies will plan an inaugural drill program to test favourable targets for Hydrogen (H) and Helium (He) after compiling the results.

Both these projects are located in Western Newfoundland and cover large portions of prospective large sedimentary basins (Parson's Pond Basin and Deer Lake Basin) which have been under explored for both H and He. Both basins are interpreted to be highly prospective environments to host both H and He with the presence of porous sandstones and conglomerates with associated mudstones and shales capping these formations. More importantly, the presence of chrome, serpentine with associated groundwater provide the mechanism to produce hydrogen including regional fault structures providing a pathway for H or He to migrate to the structural trap.

Metals Creek Resources Corp. is a junior exploration company incorporated under the laws of the Province of Ontario, is a reporting issuer in Alberta, British Columbia and Ontario, and has its common shares listed for trading on the Exchange under the symbol “MEK”. Metals Creek has earned a 50% interest in the Ogden Gold Property including the former Naybob Gold Mine, located 6 km south of Timmins, Ontario and has an 8 km strike length of the prolific Porcupine-Destor Fault (P-DF).

Additional information concerning the Company is contained in documents filed by the Company with securities regulators, available under its profile at www.sedarplus.ca.
Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

Alexander (Sandy) Stares
President and CEO
Metals Creek Resources Corp.
Cell : 709-424-1141