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Introduction
The Pendleton Lake property is located 80 kilometres east of Key Lake and consists of three contiguous claims totaling 12,819 hectares. Denison Mines Corp. has earned a 75% interest in the project.
Geologically the claims cover a 27-kilometre strike length of the Needle Falls shear zone. This is a major lithostructural break that separates the Wollaston domain to the west from the Wathaman and Peter Lake domains to the east. An esker complex parallels the shear zone. The basement rocks include sediments, volcanics and felsic intrusives.
Previous Work
The area was first explored in 1969-70 by Dynamic Petroleum Products Ltd., who carried out airborne EM, magnetic and radiometric surveys, along with reconnaissance-scale geological and geochemical surveys. The ground lapsed in 1971 and saw little if any work until it was acquired by Marline Oil Ltd. in the late 1970's. They carried out a number of ground-based exploration programs including geological mapping, prospecting and various geochemical surveys. This work met with considerable success and identified 69 radioactive boulders along the Pendleton Lake esker complex. The best results were from boulders located on the northwest shore of Pendleton Lake, which returned up to 7.17 % U3O8. These boulders were originally classified as regolith, although subsequent workers suggested that they may be felsic volcanics or silicified mylonites.
In 1980, L. Bayrock carried out a detailed surficial geological mapping program and postulated that the most likely source for the high-grade boulders was along the Needle Falls shear zone, one to three kilometres up ice and northeast of Pendleton Lake. It should be noted that in the mid 1970's, it was Bayrock who successfully identified the likely source area for the Key Lake boulder train. A number of follow-up programs were recommended but none were carried out. The ground lapsed in 1986 and remained open until it was staked by JNR in 2003.
Previous Exploration
A 510-kilometre airborne GEOTEM survey flown in the spring of 2004 outlined the presence of two dominant northeast-southwest striking conductors that transect the project lands. These conductors are very strong multi-channel EM responses that appear to be structurally controlled by the Needle Falls Shear Zone. A follow-up reconnaissance-scale surficial mapping and sampling program was carried out in 2004, followed by a short program of prospecting, boulder and till sampling in 2005.
Discussion
The high-grade boulders discovered in the 1970's are most likely related to shear zone mineralization such as that mined at Eagle Point, however; they could also be reflective of proximal unconformity-type mineralization. Although the Pendleton Lake area lies 30 kilometres southeast of the Athabasca Basin proper, sandstone outliers that could contain unconformity uranium deposits have been identified as far as 70 kilometres outside of the Basin. Irrespective of the model, previous workers are of the belief that the source of the boulders is on the property, and the discovery of either target type would be very rewarding.
The overall strength and continuity of the conductive responses from the 2004 GEOTEM survey indicate that they are most likely caused by the presence of graphitic metasediments of the Wollaston group. These lithological characteristics, accompanied by the significant structural dislocation of the area and presence of uraniferous boulders, suggest there is excellent potential for the presence of a uranium deposit on the project lands.
2007 Program
In October 2007, a three hole, 416-metre drill program was completed that included two holes on the McLaren grid and one on the U-Turn grid. In spite of poor drilling production, the results were encouraging in that all three holes intersected broad zones of structural disruption and strongly altered and sulphide-rich graphitic units with anomalous geochemistry.
Current Program
A 500-metre diamond drilling program is planned for the summer of 2008. It will follow-up and complete the helicopter-supported program that was suspended in mid-October 2007 due to adverse weather conditions.
Quality Assurance / Quality Control
JNR's Vice-President Exploration, David L. Billard, PGeo, is the Qualified Person for the Company's Athabasca Basin uranium projects. All technical information for the projects is obtained and reported under a formal quality assurance and quality control (QA/QC) program, details of which are presented in the PDF link below.
 Quality Assurance & Quality Control Program
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