The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
As it preps for 2023 exploration of new DeStaffany project North of 60 Mining News – March 31, 2023
Meter-scale spodumene mega-crystals in the 24-meter-tall wall of the historical Moose 2 mining pit on North Arrow's DeStaffany lithium project in Northwest Territories.
Click on image for large map.
North Arrow Minerals Inc. March 30 reported that its ongoing data review has identified eight lithium targets on its newly acquired DeStaffany project in Northwest Territories.
Acquired by North Arrow in January, DeStaffany is an early exploration project about 18 kilometers (11 miles) northeast of Vital Metals Ltd.'s Nechalacho rare earths mine that hosts two known lithium-tantalum-niobium bearing pegmatites – Moose 1 and Moose 2 – with some historical prospecting and sampling.
Moose 1, which is exposed on surface for about 370 meters, is roughly five meters wide on average and is up to roughly 11 meters at its maximum exposed thickness. A 7.5-meter channel sample of this pegmatite averaged 1.5% lithium oxide.
Moose 2, which surfaces for about 450 meters along strike and is up to 30 meters wide, was bulk sampled for tantalum and niobium in the 1940s and 1950s. This sampling returned up to 2.73% lithium oxide from samples over 250 meters of strike. This pegmatite, however, was never drilled for lithium due to the very few uses of this now-critical battery metal at that time.
In preparation for an initial field evaluation of the Moose 1 and Moose 2 pegmatites, North Arrow is reviewing available data related to past work at DeStaffany, including a 1998 litho-geochemical dataset consisting of composite bedrock samples collected throughout the property. The company says this data confirms lithium and cesium alteration halos associated with the Moose pegmatites, and have also been used to identify eight additional anomalies that potentially represent alteration related to undiscovered pegmatites.
Four of the geochemical targets identified correspond with features of interest identified from recently acquired GeoEye satellite imagery, including one target area where pegmatite was noted in the litho-geochemical survey data.
"Priority targets identified by North Arrow's ongoing review of historic datasets and new satellite imagery will help focus initial prospecting work this summer, with the goal of discovering new spodumene pegmatites within the DeStaffany property," said North Arrow Minerals President and CEO Ken Armstrong.
North Arrow has also reviewed available photographs of the property. Photos of the Moose 2 pegmatite confirm the local presence of meter-scale pale green to grey spodumene crystals. In particular, coarse spodumene megacrysts are prominent in the lower western wall of the historic mining pit, confirming that spodumene was not targeted by past mining. These exposures of spodumene mineralization should allow for collection this summer of samples sufficient for mineral recovery and characterization studies.
North Arrow is also pleased to report that, as part of its strategic alliance with Panarc Resources, it has acquired new mineral claims on Baffin Island, Nunavut. Staked targets are located within 12 kilometers (7.5 miles) of tidewater in an area where thick granite pegmatites have been mapped by government geologists.
Over his more than 16 years of covering mining and mineral exploration, Shane has become renowned for his ability to report on the sector in a way that is technically sound enough to inform industry insiders while being easy to understand by a wider audience.
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