Okapi Resources Ltd (ASX:OKR) shares surged as much as 15% higher intra-day after receiving high-grade vanadium assay results from the rock chip sample program at its Rattler Uranium Project in the La Sal Mining District, Utah, US.
A total of 28 rock samples which were collected from the Rattler Uranium Project in December 2021 were recently analysed for vanadium; of the samples collected 18 reported values greater than 5,000 ppm V2O5 (0.5% V2O5).
Okapi decided to have the pulp samples reanalysed for vanadium after the exceptional uranium grades from the rock chip samples (announced on 10 March 2022) which included 15 of the 28 samples reporting values greater than 1,000 ppm U3O8.
Okapi managing director Andrew Ferrier said: “The Vanadium assay results continue to confirm the high-grade nature of the mineralisation at the Company’s Rattler Uranium Project with numerous assays across both Rattlesnake and Sunnyside showing exceptional high-grade uranium and vanadium.
“The Company has already received a permit to drill at Rattler and is keen to follow up these excellent results with further drilling. Vanadium is an important metal being on the U.S. Government’s list of Critical Minerals.
“Vanadium is primarily used in high-strength steel production which is needed in defence and aerospace applications and has a growing importance in greener technologies such as batteries.”
Samples came from the mineralised sedimentary horizon in the old Rattlesnake Mine open pit as well as from outcrop and dumps outside the entrances to old mine workings; they also include rock samples collected from outcrops and the mine dumps in the Sunnyside claim block around the now abandoned Sunnyside Mine.
Project background
The Rattler Uranium Project comprises 98 Bureau of Land Management (BLM) unpatented Federal mining claims (encompassing about 1,960 acres) 85 kilometres north of Energy Fuels Inc’s White Mesa Uranium/Vanadium mill in Utah – the only operating conventional uranium mill in the USA.
The project area includes the historical Rattlesnake open-pit mine, which was discovered around 1948 and operated until about 1954.
Historical production from the Rattlesnake pit reportedly totalled 285,000 tonnes of ore at 2,800ppm U3O8 and 10,000ppm V2O5 for 1.6 million pounds of U3O8 and 4.5 million pounds of V2O5.
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