Purepoint Announces Rio Tinto Winter Exploration Plan on Red Willow Option
TORONTO, ONTARIO -- (Marketwire) -- 11/30/11 -- Purepoint Uranium Group Inc. (TSX VENTURE: PTU) is pleased to report the Winter 2012 exploration plan from Rio Tinto Exploration Canada Inc. for Purepoint's Red Willow Project in Saskatchewan's Athabasca Basin. Purepoint optioned the property to Rio Tinto late last year, allowing them to earn a controlling interest in the Red Willow Project by spending up to $22.5 million in exploration and development expenses.
'Drilling is planned at the Osprey and Geneva Areas, both of which have returned anomalous intercepts of uranium, pathfinding elements and basement alteration' said Scott Frostad, Purepoint's Vice President, Exploration. 'Rio Tinto's drill program has been defined by a year of detailed analysis and the completion of a regional 3D model that incorporates the extensive geophysical data collected to date'.
Highlights
-- Approximately 1,500 metres of diamond drilling on targets within the
Osprey (intercepts up to 0.20% eU3O8 over 5.8 metres) and Geneva areas
(intercepts up to 0.33% U3O8 over 0.5 metres);
-- Gravity survey in the Geneva area to infill and extend the known gravity
low targets that are potential zones of hydrothermal alteration.
Osprey Area
The Osprey Conductor is an 'S'-shaped electromagnetic conductor that is over six kilometres in length. Ground geophysics conducted over the area includes 3D resistivity, fixed-loop EM, stepwise moving-loop, gravity and magnetics. Rio Tinto conducted additional Gradient Induced Polarization (IP) this summer to further define exploration targets prior to the winter drill program.
A primary drill target this winter will be a weak EM conductor, approximately 700 metres in length, that lies beneath Osprey Lake and is seen to cross-cut the main Osprey conductor near the 0.20% eU3O8 over 5.8 metres intercept. The east-west trending conductor follows the shape of Osprey Lake and is coincident with a magnetic low, a gravity low as well as a resistivity low. This area is previously untested by diamond drilling.
Geneva Area
A gravity survey and follow-up diamond drilling is currently planned this winter for the Geneva area located near the southwest corner of the Red Willow property. An airborne electromagnetic survey (VTEM) delineated 3.8 kilometers of conductors at Geneva that are within a distinct fold structure highlighted by the aeromagnetic results. Eldorado Resources, a predecessor to Cameco, intersected a graphitic fault zone that returned 0.22% U3O8 over 1.0 metres in the Geneva area during a 1984 drill program.
A gravity survey is planned early this winter to infill and extend gravity low targets identified by Purepoint in 2007. The three known gravity lows coincide with low apparent resistivity chimneys (LARC Principal, R. Koch, PDAC Convention 2007) in the sandstone that may represent zones of hydrothermal alteration. In 1995, Cameco ranked basement alteration of drill holes on their Rabbit Lake project, which once included a portion of the Red Willow project, using pathfinding elements (Pb, Ni, Cu, U, total clay and chlorite) and a hole from the Geneva area, RAD-17, returned the highest alteration score of the 366 drill holes ranked.
Three separate EM conductors have been interpreted from the VTEM survey results. The first is approximately 2 kilometers in length and is a moderate to strong, arcuate conductor known to represent graphitic sediments. All the EM profiles indicate that it has a plate source dipping at a shallow angle inward and conforms to basement geology (i.e. magnetic and gradient resistivity). The second and third conductors are both approximately 900 metres in length and roughly parallel to each other. The resistivity results from a gradient IP survey and the pole-dipole array IP survey also appear to be reflecting basement geology with pelitic sediments as resistivity lows that are locally faulted.
Red Willow
The Red Willow property covers 25,612 hectares on the eastern edge of the Athabasca Basin. The Athabasca sandstone is shallow and the depth to unconformity varies from zero to 80 metres. The basement rocks are composed of intensely deformed and metamorphosed sedimentary, volcanic and plutonic rocks trending NE to SW. Five major uranium deposits are located along a NE to SW mine trend that extends through the Red Willow Project.
The Red Willow property adjoins AREVA Resource Canada Inc.'s claim group that contains the JEB, Sue, McClean and Caribou deposits to the west and, to the south adjoins UEX's Hidden Bay property that surrounds Cameco Corporation's Rabbit Lake, Collins Bay and Eagle Point deposits.
About Purepoint
Purepoint Uranium Group Inc. is focused on the precision exploration of its twelve projects in the Canadian Athabasca Basin. Purepoint proudly maintains project ventures in the Basin with the three largest uranium producers in the world, Cameco Corporation, AREVA and Rio Tinto. Established in the Athabasca Basin well before the initial resurgence in uranium earlier last decade, Purepoint is actively advancing a large portfolio of multiple drill targets in the world's richest uranium region.
Scott Frostad BSc, MASc, PGeo, Purepoint's Vice President, Exploration, is the Qualified Person responsible for technical content of this release.
THE TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE HAS NOT REVIEWED AND DOES NOT ACCEPT RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE ADEQUACY OR ACCURACY OF THIS RELEASE.
Contacts:
Purepoint Uranium Group Inc.
Chris Frostad
President and CEO
(416) 603-8368
www.purepoint.ca
