Good Afternoon GoldBaron et al:

You are absolutely correct in your opinion that the truth is told by the drill bit, but the advancements in aerial surveying are just starting to acknowledge market demand. I would like to expand on Khareema’s comparison to O&G exploration.

Back in 1946, Imperial-Oil (Esso / ExxonMobil) spudded Leduc #1 (in Alberta) based on the abundance of coal in the Devon / Leduc area and the sneaky suspicion of the ‘Rig Manager’ which I still call the ‘”Tool Push”. They successfully tapped the most impressive Oil reservoir of that era. What now seems like an ancient pump jack was installed. About three miles away a company named “Atlantic” had the rights to drill for oil. At that time, “reservoir engineering” resided in the minds of the rig crew. Experience and premonition was the science. Atlantic drilled forward towards the same depth as Esso and suddenly and before they had reached target depth the earth puked and puked and puked. For weeks the oil cleared the crown of the rig and flooded the farmers’ fields with millions of barrels of oil. Today the press would call this an environmental disaster, back then the term was “Bonanza”.

What happened was that Atlantic had tapped into a terminal reef. This is a crown of porous coral that traced the coast of the prehistoric Cretaceous Seaway aka the NiobraranSea. The oil rushed to the surface with the hydrostatic force of an Alberta artesian well.

Seismic radiography was not heard of at that time but a few science guys figured if they could physically shock the ground and read the rate of reflection at different points on surface, they could create a subteranean map of prehistoric physical features. Over the next 60 years, seismic radiography has evolved into a precise 3 dimensional science by corelating field results to seismic images and targeting drill holes, angles and depth. Reef formations have become the preferred O&G targets. Now the pipelines often preceed the drilling rig as Khareema states.

Seismic mapping only works on sedimentary rock, but the scientific process is very close to the magnetic surveys being conducted in hard rock mineral exploration. Similiarly, satellite imaging of the earth’s surface has progressed to the point now where scientists are able to pinpoint ancient riverbeds, 5000 year old pyramid foundations, indigenous campsites etc. The only thing limiting our advancements in these fields is the hours of review and investigation of the data.

This is where the 21st century supercomputor processing power comes into play. Huge mathmatical algorithms (think of this as; IF / THEN logic) now digest data so fast we could call this process first generation artificial intelligence. This is the relevence to the RoF. The various breeds of aerial magnetic survey imaging provide the data. Drill core and assays provide the corelation and the accuracy improves expedentially in a very short period of time. The amount of activity in the RoF represents a microcosm for algorithmic IF / THEN logic.

I expect new arial surveys to be more specific to mineral type, depth and location. I expect old surveys to be resurected and re-run for the same purpose.

I think that all explorers in the RoF are going to experience a rush of accurate and measurable drill targets. I think that some of the players are already sitting on this information waiting for drill crews and their mechanical monsters to validate the logic and verify mineral type, concentration and therefore quantity.

Of course the drill cores and assays will still be required to satisfy the 43-101 criteria prior to News Releases.

Aafab