Similarities with the famous Tanco Mine, ManitobaThe ore body of Tanco Mine is 1400 m long, 600 m wide and 100 m deep. By comparison, Raleigh Lake’s magnetic body is much larger than Tanco’s deposit.
Raleigh Lake: The 2019 exploration programme confirmed the existence of a 3km x 1km magnetic body, believed to contain lithium-bearing pegmatites.ILC hopes that this year’s drilling programme will confirm a near-continuous seam of mineralisation geologically similar to the huge Tanco mine.
When ILC revisited the exploration results at Raleigh Lake, Anthony Kovacs noted how the intersections of pegmatites over hundreds of metres were almost continuous. The intersections were every 5-10 metres, with lithium-oxide grades of more than 2% in most cases. Furthermore, the drilling over a 300m x 600m area confirmed that the resource was open in all directions.
The upside potential at Raleigh Lake is based on Kovacs’ view that Raleigh Lake shares geological similarities with the large and “storied” Tanco mine to the west of Raleigh. Tanco is an underground mine on the north-western shore of Bernic Lake, which is owned by Cabot Corporation. The pegmatite ore body at Tanco is unique, having a very thick zone of mineralisation (essentially a single unit), which is shallow and flat-lying. The “LCT” (lithium, caesium, tantalum) mineralisation at Tanco includes: lithium-containing spodumene; caesium-containing pollucite; and tantalum-containing simpsonite and tantalite.
Similarities with Tanco identified:
The ILC news release noted that the magnetic body: “is comparable in size to the gabbroic rocks hosting the mineralized pegmatites at the Tanco mine.”It also noted:“There is a striking resemblance to the emplacement style of mineralized pegmatites at Tanco making the Raleigh Lake gabbro a highly prospective target.”
Results of 2020 Drilling:
A drilling programme in 2020, likely about 2,000 metres and costing about C$0.6m, will target the area from the known mineralisation towards the southwest into what the UAV-MAG identified as the main part of the gabbroic body. If successful, the results of the drilling programme will form the basis of a maiden resource estimate for Raleigh Lake. Publication is expected by autumn of this year