$1.3m air-borne geophysics for Oklo project

An airborne geophysical survey has commenced at Oklo Uranium’s Kidal Project....

  An airborne geophysical survey has commenced at Oklo Uranium’s Kidal Project, in northeast Mali, West Africa. According to Oklo, the combined radiometric and aeromagnetic survey will cover the entire project area of approximately 19,000sqkm, at a cost of approximately $1.3m.The Kidal Project area occupies the west part of the geological region known as L’Adrar Des Iforas, which largely comprises Pan African crystalline basement rocks, comprising various radiometrically anomalous granites and moderate to high and metamorphic lithologies. Oklo Managing Director, Ross Brown said the survey represented a considerable capital investment and that the company believes the region to have great potential as an under explored uranium destination. L’Adrar Des Iforas is the south-western extension of a larger Pan African-age shield that also includes the Hoggar Massif of Algeria and the Aïr Massif of Niger. In Niger, rocks of the Aïr Massif are believed to be the source of uranium present in the sediments of the Tim Mersoï Basin, mined at several locations by Areva subsidiary companies. Niger is one of the top five leading producers of uranium in the world, having achieved a historic mine production of 100,000 tonnes of uranium and in November 2006. Oklo’s Exploration Manager, Nigel Maund said L’Adrar Des Iforas is of the same geological age and is geologically analogous to the Pan African Damara Mobile Belt in Namibia. The airborne geophysical survey at Kidal has a total of 53,676 line kilometres of radiometrics and aeromagnetics and will take approximately two months to complete. According to Oklo, the survey is designed to establish potential radiometric anomalies that might be associated with hard-rock targets, such as pegmatites/ alaskites, and sedimentary targets, such as in-valley calcrete deposits associated with palaeochannels. Oklo said pegmatites are known to occur within the project area, with the region dissected by an extensive fossil drainage system. The survey will be flown by Universal Tracking Systems, using a fixed wing, single-engine aircraft in an east-west direction. The line spacing will be 400m and the sensor height above ground will be 50m.