CanAlaska Uranium Ltd. (CanAlaska) has reported assay results from its August 2009 drill program at the Fond Du Lac project, Athabasca Basin, Canada. The company's drill program of 19 holes was targeted on geophysical features which may represent the location of mineralized feeder zones for the Fond Du Lac unconformity-style sandstone hosted uranium deposit.
Hole FDL 017, a step-out hole on the east side of a major crosscutting structure, intercepted a long zone of uranium mineralization in the basement rocks, east of, and below the Fond Du Lac deposit sandstone horizon. This zone starts at 41 meters (134 feet) below surface. Hole FDL017 returned 40.4 meters averaging 0.32% U3O8 , including six meters averaging 1.13% U3O8 (22.6 lb/ton), with individual values of half-meter samples grading up to 3.77% U3O8.
The Fond Du Lac project is located on the northern portion of the Athabasca Basin, Saskatchewan, where the Athabasca sandstone units have minimal thicknesses of 20-75 meters overlying the unconformity. This area was explored by AMOK in the 1960’s and AMOK and Eldorado Nuclear in the 1970’s and early 1980’s. The property is part of the Fond Du Lac Denesuline First Nation Reserve Lands, and CanAlaska is working with the community under an option to earn a 49% interest in the project. A small uranium resource (non 43-101 compliant) was previously discovered in the sandstone units, immediately above the unconformity. However, no significant effort was made to explore for structurally-hosted uranium mineralization in the basement rock at that time. The historic zones of uranium mineralization at Fond Du Lac are principally within the Manitou Falls Formation of the Athabasca Sandstone sequence, and are characterized by strong fracturing, intense silicification, zones of hematisation and minor clay alteration. Zoning is apparent, with a central highly-mineralized-core. The mineralization is evident as disseminations and replacement in the sandstone.
The 2009 drilling at Fond Du Lac was successful on two fronts. The drilling defined a new mineralized extension to the historical deposit as well as significant uranium mineralization in the basement.
The intercepts in diamond drill hole FDL017 are located 70 metres North-East of the known uranium deposit, on the east side of a NNW trending mylonite zone. The mineralization occurs as narrow fracture fillings and breccia impregnation in mylonitic garnet-biotite gneisses. The main NNW structure was evident from the geophysical surveys performed by CanAlaska prior to the current drill programs (magnetics, VTEM, gravity and IP-resistivity surveys were carried out). The structural events appear younger than the main deformation associated with the Grease River Shear Zone, which cuts the property south of the area of current drilling.
The morphology of the new mineralized zone is not well known as yet, but appears to be trending in a general E-W direction and with a dip close to vertical. The known deposit to the southwest trends at 050°; an orientation that is parallel to the regional Grease River Shear Zone.