some mind-blowing facts about rossing south

As most of you know I have been a keen investor & amateur researcher of uranium, and in particular, Namibian uranium stocks. While I have had my main investment in BMN, I have become interested in EXT after the Rossing South find was confirmed. On a separate note, I have also had some disagreements with some posters here on the EXT thread, they have now been either “evicted” or have chosen to leave Hotcopper!

With the above in mind, I have decided that now is the time to comment on certain misconception that many seem to have about uranium in Namibia, and in particular, how it affects Extract & Rossing South. This is a little “mind-blowing”, and took some time for me to get my head around.

Some posters here and on the DYL thread have commented on the Rossing minaralised zone running SOUTH, down from Rossing through EXT’s Rossing South, and perhaps into DYL’s land. I have seen a number of posters refer to this a number on many occasions, but have decided to remain quiet until now.

These are the facts:
The main uranium in Namibia is associated with the Damaran Orogeny. An Orogeny is all to do with the tectonic plate movement and collisions between the Cratons, followed by prolonged periods of thermal events collectively called an Orogeny,

Some quoted information about Orogeny:
“Orogeny can occur due to continental collision and subsequent volcanic activity. During orogeny, deeply buried rocks may be pushed to the surface. Sea bottom and near shore material may cover some or all of the orogenic area. The orogeny usually produces long linear structures, known as orogenic belts. Generally, orogenic belts consist of long strips of rock exhibiting similar characteristics along the length of the belt. Orogenic belts are associated with subduction zones, which produce volcanoes, and build island arcs. These island arcs may be added to a continent during an orogenic event.”

With that out the way, we can summarise by saying that the Damaran Orogeny in Namibia was formed at a time of massive geological upheaval. This is a juncture of THREE separate cratons, the Kalahari Craton in the South, the Congo Craton in the North, with the Rio De Plata Craton in the West (now under the Atlantic Ocean). It is assumed that these cratons collided at some ancient time … Imagine these plates colliding then subsiding, and in so doing, initiating vast amounts of unbelievable volcanic thermal activity, with vast molten flows filling this geological void.

The key question is: In which direction did these thermal melts flow? As mentioned some have thought they flowed down, South! That is not the case!! The pics below show the placement of the three cratons, and how they subsided to form the Domaran Orogeny. The main area of the Oregeny we are interested in is the CENTRAL ZONE. It is this zone that hosts “Alaskite Alley”, which is the zone that hosts the main “alley” of primary Alaskite uranium. Have a look at these … I have added some arrows to assist visually:




So we see that the molten flows that eventually solidified into “Alaskite Alley”actually flowed North to North West! Think about it … it all makes sense! I remember some years back wondering why the uranium at BMN’s Anomaly A was trapped at the Southern end of Palmenhorst Dome, and why Rossings urainiu all lay trapped to the South of the Rossing Dome … then it clicked into place!! The flow was actually going North/North East, trapping uranium against the Dome as it flow NORTH! As it flowed it eventually began to subside in mineralization and grade, from Rossing South, through Rossing, and on to Valencia, and with smaller deposits dotted along the Damara Orogen, up through Botswana, Zambia & Malawi. See pic:


Now to the “mind blowing” aspect to all of this: The channel of uranium flowing North, that makes up the recently found deposits of Rossing South, are actually the SOURCE uranium that fed into the Rossing deposit currently mined by Rio Tinto!! That’s why everyone wants a piece of Exract … they have found the high grade source to the main Rossing deposit. When you look at the graphic released by EXT, you can quite clearly see the flow direction:


What more they will find … no one knows, but IMO you would be an idiot to sell your shares knowing this!

Some food for thought!

Cheers all