TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – Rio Tinto Canada Uranium Corporation is currently mobilising two diamond drill rigs to its 60%-owned Henday property, located on the north-eastern margin of the Athabasca basin.
Rio Tinto, which holds the property in partnership with minority owner Forum Uranium, had the option to earn another 10% in the property upon spending either $20-million on exploration or delivering a feasibility study on the Henday property.
Forum Uranium on Monday reported that Rio Tinto had identified a number of drill targets from a 1 204 line kilometre airborne magnetic and electromagnetic survey completed this past summer.
Henday is strategically located north-east of the Denison/Areva Midwest Lake deposit and Rio Tinto’s Roughrider deposit, and borders Areva/Denison's McClean Lake uranium mine and mill.
The Geotech survey was flown in two directions over the property with lines oriented N040⁰ at 100 m line spacing and with lines oriented N135⁰ at 200 m line spacing. The survey was flown with an instrumentation clearance of 55 m above ground.
Forum advised that these parameters had resulted in a high resolution of data to be used for drill target selection. Coupled with a compilation of all geological, geophysical, geochemical and drill data in assessment files, plus selective logging and sampling of available drill core, two high-priority areas had been identified on the property for drilling this winter.
The Henday project comprises three claims covering 7 204 ha of the Athabasca basin, in Saskatchewan, the world's chief source of high-grade uranium. It currently supplies about 20% of the world's uranium.
Exploration efforts since 2007, when Forum acquired the project, uncovered several large alteration zones with associated elevated uranium geochemistry. Further targets remain to be drill tested.