Following High-Grade Uranium Discovery
While many companies in the Canadian resource sector are slowly winding down due to weather conditions, uranium company Aero Energy (TSXV AERO / Frankfurt UU3) is planning a winter drilling program for its Murmac project. This aims to follow up on the high-grade uranium discovery made in the summer.
The Murmac uranium project is located in northern Saskatchewan near Uranium City, on the northern edge of the Athabasca Basin, famous for its uranium deposits. Aero, together with partner Fortune Bay, will focus the winter drilling on the Howland Lake North target area. There, this summer, drill hole M24-017 intersected 8.40 meters at 0.30% uranium oxide (U3O8), including 1.20 meters at 1.79% U3O8. Individual samples even contained grades of up to 13.80% U3O8 and 4.54% U3O8 over 0.10 meters. As Aero reported at the time, this high-grade uranium mineralization of more than 1% U3O8 occurred at a depth of only 64 meters below the surface – in graphitic rock that Aero’s geologists had identified as particularly favorable for uranium occurrences.
Six More Drill Holes Planned
However, the high-grade results from the summer are not the only reason the company is now focusing on Howland Lake North. Additionally, anomalous uranium contents and elevated values of geochemical pathfinder elements were discovered in all three drill holes surrounding M24-017 (50 in the dip and along the strike). According to Aero Energy, this indicates the presence of an extensive discordant mineralization system in the Athabasca Basin along the Howland Lake North graphitic conductor. The company believes that extension drilling is therefore justified along the 1-kilometer extent of this graphitic conductive structure, which lies beneath the shallow Howland Lake.
Aero Energy now plans to drill about six holes with a total length of 900 meters along the Howland Lake North graphitic conductor. Before the drills start turning, however, a detailed survey of radon content in the water will be conducted to select drill targets even more precisely. This survey will also partially cover a graphitic conductive structure that runs under the southern part of Howland Lake. There, Aero’s partner Fortune Bay drilled 0.17% U3O8 in 2022.
In any case, according to Abitibi, Howland Lake North is just one of numerous promising targets found along Murmac’s extensive graphitic corridors – with a strike length of over 35 kilometers – that warrant further drilling. Similar to Howland Lake North, Aero Energy continues, these areas combine encouraging geophysical signatures, favorable geological and structural conditions, and proximity to uranium finds at the surface.
Galen McNamara, CEO of Aero Energy, explains: “We are excited to advance exploration at Murmac in collaboration with Fortune Bay, building on the results of the successful summer drilling campaign. The project has proven to be highly promising with its largely unexplored graphitic corridors under a thin surface cover – and the recent drilling results underscore the potential for a near-surface, high-grade basement discovery. We look forward to mobilizing our teams for the upcoming winter program, focusing on the Howland Lake North target area.”
In June and July, Aero completed eight drill holes along the Howland, Armbruster, and Pitchvein corridors, encountering not only extremely favorable geological conditions for high-grade basement deposits associated with the Athabasca Basin but also repeatedly anomalous radioactivity. Overall, anomalous uranium values (>100 ppm) were encountered in five out of eight drill holes. These drill holes intersected near-surface anomalous uranium with an enrichment of pathfinder elements typical of high-grade deposits in the basement of the Athabasca Basin, according to the company.
