TRENCH METALS CORP. Trench Metals Corp. has been granted the requisite permit on the Higginson Lake Uranium Property, from the Saskatchewan Ministry of Environment and Lands, for a fall exploration program to commence immediately. The Crown Land Work Authorization Permit authorizes the Company to conduct low impact prospecting, geological mapping, and sampling on multiple target areas over the entire Property.
Exploration crews from Exploration Facilitation Unlimited Inc. will fly in daily by float plane to the Property from the Points North logistical base. The exploration activities are expected to be completed in mid- October. Uranium mineralization at the Higginson Lake Property is interpreted to be controlled by the Black Lake Fault, a major northeast striking regional fault that transects the Athabasca Basin.
As previously reported (Press Release October 18, 2021), the Property hosts a historic drill-indicated reserves of 4.8 million pounds of U3O8 (1). Previous exploration at the Property has identified twelve historic showings, associated with two significant uranium trends identified in an internal company summary report by Exploration Facilitation Unlimited Inc. This report was based on a review of Saskatchewan assessment reports and private data. Charlebois-Diane Trend- The northern uranium trend strikes east-southeast from the Charlebois Lake showings to the Dianne uranium showings, with projections to the southeast on the recently expanded claims, extending for over seven kilometres.
The Charlebois Lake showings have seen little modern exploration and has hundreds of metres of exposure and is the source of the highest assay value results on the property of 1.57% U3O8. The pegmatite showing area is underlaid by massive gneissic granite intruding a metasedimentary series. The contacts consist of a zone of biotite injection gneiss, biotite schists and granite, up to 91 metres wide.
At intervals in this contact zone are sill-like lenses of fine-grained biotite pegmatite several metres wide and hundreds of metres long. The radioactivity in the pegmatites is associated with quartz- and biotite-rich portions and is probably due to dissemination of fine-grained uraninite. Yellow staining can be seen intermittently over the zones.
Corrigan Lake Trend Located southwest of, and paralleling (WNW-ESE), the Charlebois- Diane Trend, the Corrigan Lake Trend was explored by trenching and diamond drilling in the 1950s, with a historical drill indicated resource, which was published in the Northern Miner (May 1956) of 2,000,000 tons grading greater than 0.1% U3O8, or 4,400,000 lbs U3O8. (Saskatchewan Mineral Deposit Index File 1656). In addition, a 2008 VTEM report interpretation lists a series of anomalies in the vicinity of the showing as the highest priority targets on the grid flown.
The Corrigan Lake showing is underlain by red granite gneisses in the north in contact with migmatites in the south. White pegmatite occurs along the contact and exhibits high radioactivity. The Higginson Lake property is remarkably under explored, with many targets not worked since the 1950-1960s.
The current exploration program will investigate the known historic uranium showings and mineralized zones with the intention of confirming both grade and extent. In addition, the Company has also identified several new zones on interest, which appear to be related to the historic zones and many could expand the overall dimensions of the Higginson system.
