IsoEnergy just reported (2020) chemical assays from two drill holes that intersected strong radioactivity early in the winter drilling program at the Hurricane zone. The Hurricane zone is a new discovery of high-grade uranium mineralization on the Company’s 100% owned Larocque East property (the “Property”) in the Eastern Athabasca Basin of Saskatchewan.
Highlights:
1) Drill hole LE20-34 intersected 5 meters of uranium mineralization that averages 33.9% U3O8 from 326.0 to 334.5 meters, including 5.0 meters that averages 57.1% U3O8 from 328.0 to 333.0 meters. This is the strongest intercept drilled to date on the property.
2) Drill hole LE20-32A also intersected 5 meters of uranium mineralization that averages 19.6% U3O8 from 329.5-338.0 meters, including 2.5 meters that averages 63.6% U3O8 from 334.5-337.0 meters depth.
3) The two drill holes are located on the west end of the Hurricane zone, approximately 75 meters apart.
Due to the positive results to date, the drill program has been expanded by 4 drill holes to a total of 24 drill holes. The Company remains well-funded with over C$5 million in the treasury. Craig Parry, Chief Executive Officer commented: “The grades and thicknesses seen in these holes speak for themselves and justify an expansion to the current program. We’re approximately two-thirds of the way through this drill program and look forward to reporting additional results.”
Steve Blower, Vice President of Exploration commented: “Drill holes LE20-34 and LE20-32A intersections give us new insight into the controls on very high-grade uranium mineralization at Hurricane. Drill hole LE20-34, for example, is located at the junction of the “H” fault and the sub-Athabasca unconformity. That horizon has not been well drilled yet at Hurricane, suggesting that there is good potential for more mineralization like this.”
Drill Hole LE20-34 was drilled as a 25 meters step-out to the northwest of previously reported LE20-30 (5.5 meters @ 7.1% U3O8). It cored strongly altered sandstone before intersecting 8.5 meters of strong uranium mineralization averaging 33.9% U3O8 from 326.0 to 334.5 meters. The interval includes an extremely high-grade subinterval of 5.0 meters averaging 57.1% U3O8. Within this subinterval is a 2.0 meters length of semi-massive to massive black and brown pitchblende that is off-scale (>65,000CPS) on the RS-125 hand-held spectrometer (the “RS-125”) and averages 62.8% U3O8. Mineralization straddles the sub-Athabasca unconformity .
Drill hole LE20-32A was completed to infill a 50 meters along-strike gap between 2019 mineralized drill holes LE19-09 (4.5 meters @ 4.2% U3O8) and LE19-12 (8.5 meters @ 3.2% U3O8). It intersected strongly altered sandstone before coring 8.5 meters of strong uranium mineralization that averages 19.6% U3O8 from 329.5 to 338.0 meters. Similar to LE20-34, the interval includes an extremely high-grade subinterval of 2.5 meters averaging 63.6% U3O8. Within this subinterval is a 1.5 meters length of semi-massive to massive black pitchblende that is off-scale on the RS-125 (>65,000 CPS) and averages 76.7% U3O8.
Drill hole LE20-40 was completed on section with drill hole LE20-34 to evaluate the extent of high-grade mineralization to the south of that drill hole. It successfully intersected 4.0 meters of uranium mineralization >500 CPS (RS-125) from 322.5 to 326.5 meters, including 1.5 meters of very strong radioactivity and 0.5 meters that is off-scale on the RS-125.
Drill 2 continues to deliver encouraging initial results well to the east of the current Hurricane zone footprint. Drill hole LE20-41 was completed as another under-cutting stratigraphic drill hole designed to locate favorable basement rocks and structures approximately 1.2 km east of the eastern end of the Hurricane zone footprint. The hole was successful, as it intersected a thick package of highly graphitic basement rocks disrupted by brittle cataclastic faults. The up-dip projection of the structures to the unconformity will be targeted later in this program.
Next Steps
Drill 1 remains on the west end of the Hurricane zone, continuing to infill the current footprint of the zone, extending the mineralization to the property boundary, and evaluating new targets generated by the results in drill holes LE20-32A and LE20-34. Drill 2 will continue to evaluate the potential to expand the zone to the east by following up on the brittle structures intersected at depth in undercutting stratigraphic drill holes LE20-37, 39 and 41. Further results of the program will be reported periodically throughout the winter drill season.
The Larocque East Property and the Hurricane Zone
The 100% owned Larocque East property consists of 20 mineral claims totaling 8,371 ha and is not encumbered by any royalties or other interests. Larocque East is immediately adjacent to the north end of IsoEnergy’s Geiger property and is 35 km northwest of Orano Canada’s McClean Lake uranium mine and mill.
Along with other target areas, the Property covers a 15-kilometer-long northeast extension of the Larocque Lake conductor system; a trend of graphitic metasedimentary basement rocks that is associated with significant uranium mineralization at the Hurricane zone, and in several occurrences on Cameco Corp.’s neighboring property to the southwest of Larocque East. The Hurricane zone was discovered in July, 2018 and was followed up with a 12-hole drilling campaign in the winter of 2019 and a recently completed 17-hole summer 2019 drilling campaign. Dimensions are currently 550 meters along-strike, 40 meter wide and up to 10 meters thick. The zone is open for expansion along-strike and on most sections. Mineralization is polymetallic and commonly straddles the sub-Athabasca unconformity 320 meters below surface. The best intersection to date is 33.9% U3O8 over 8.5 meters in drill hole LE20-34.
Drilling at Cameco Corp.’s Larocque Lake zone on the neighboring property to the southwest has returned historical intersections of up to 29.9% U3O8 over 7.0 meters in drill hole Q22-040. Like the nearby Geiger property, Larocque East is located adjacent to the Wollaston-Mudjatik transition zone – a major crustal suture related to most of the uranium deposits in the eastern Athabasca Basin. Importantly, the sandstone cover on the Property is thin, ranging between 140 meters and 330 meters in previous drilling. In addition to the Hurricane zone discovery, four historical drill holes have intersected weak uranium mineralization at other locations on the Property to date.
Read on ....
[ To compliment the reporting above, here is the NI-43-101 Independent Report by an outside geologist prepared just before the completion of the above drilling that revealed the very high uranium grades:
http://www.i2mconsultants.com/downloads/corp/LarocqueNI43-101-2019.pdf
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