Great Western Mining Corporation*
– Going for Gold (and Uranium)
- Speculative Buy at 29.75p

	Key Data
	EPIC	GWM
	Share Price	29.75p
	Spread	29p-30.5p
	Total no of shares	26,752,000 shares
	Market Cap	£7.96 million
	12 Month Range	10p-35.5p
	Market	Plus Markets
	Website	www.greatwesternmining.com
	Sector	Mining
	Contact	Emmet O’ Connell – Chairman
	Net cash reserves	£0.48 million

The Mineral County of Nevada has a long history of exploration. The claim area, known as ‘The Bass Mine’ produced unknown quantities of gold and silver between 1908 and 1930 but these claims were first staked in the 1870s. In the mid-1980’s, Great Western’s Chairman, Emmett O’ Connell, then CEO of Eglinton Exploration plc (an Irish based oil company quoted on the Dublin and London Stock Exchanges), worked on a number of prospects in the area with Dan Bracket, an ageing local prospector. Due to the falling price of gold during that time O’ Connell did not pursue any detailed exploration in the claim area but left all his mining supplies and equipment with Bracket paying him a stipend for looking after it.

Two years after Bracket’s death in 1993, O’ Connell received a claim map from a known Nevada-based solicitor, advising him that the claim map and related information was left by Bracket for O’ Connell’s attention. With the price of gold rising in recent years, in 2005 O’ Connell sought to seek out the claim, stake it and file it in accordance with the State of Nevada regulations. This effort was successful as the claim had lapsed in 1993. As a result Great Western Mining was launched in 2006.  A preliminary ground sampling survey was undertaken on the 21 gold, silver and uranium lode claims in the summer of that year, aided to a large degree by a geological report from 1980.

Gold and Silver Mineralisation

The results of the prospect, referred to in more recent years as the ‘Ming Toy’, confirmed gold and silver values in all its lode claims tested in the Little Huntoon Valley area, near Marietta, Mineral County, Nevada.  The results of the surface sampling programme confirmed a wide variety of mineral values, with gold and silver present in all samples (as
table below).

Element	Gold (Au)	Silver (Ag)
Unit Sample	Grams per ton	Grams per ton
1	0.81	446.96
2	0.06	5.91
3	1.18	532.8
4	0.19	8.08
5	0.06	1.55
6	0.06	4.35
7	2.64	63.14
8	0.47	33.59

Preliminary Surface Sampling Survey, Ming Toy – Source: GWMC

A second more detailed sampling survey was conducted in 2006, which was published in early 2007, confirming the presence of potentially economic deposits of gold and silver. The positive development of the sampling survey is that it confirmed extensive mineralization across the claim with the presence of associated values of base metals, such as copper, lead and zinc.

Sample	Grams per ton		PPM (parts per million)
	Gold (Au)	Silver (Ag)	Copper (Cu)	Lead (Pb)	Zinc (Zn)
A	0.705	757	161	2564	580
A-2	2.115	120	223	995	162
B	0.151	765	407	2409	377
C	2.565	698	231	2519	171
D-2	3.249	5.2	16	183	184
E	0.027	291	303	842	385

Second Sampling Survey, Ming Toy – Source: GWMC

In late November 2007, while the company was collecting soil and pit samples along the flanks of the adit being tested for uranium, test results showed ore grade values of gold and silver in several field samples shown in the table below. These results were published yesterday. Sample IWM-5 in particular was of particular high silver grade, containing silver bearing lead sulphide. The company currently awaits the results of the bulk uranium tests, due later this month. 

Element	Gold (Au)	Silver (Ag)
Unit Sample	Grams per ton	Grams per ton
IWM-1	6.78	1,549
IWM-4	7.77	123.48
IWM-5	68.43	4,696.60
IWM-6	12.75	332.8
IWM-11	1.06	44.48
IWM-12	7.59	419.9
MC5A	3.67	69.3
MT122-04	6.16	90.8

The Uranium proposition

According to Great Western the potential for uranium mineralization was never properly assessed, even though historically the presence of uranium was reported on the Ming Toy claims. The lack of uranium exploration activity was in part down to the market’s overwhelming interest in gold/silver during the 1980’s but also to the loss of interest in uranium exploration after the Chernobyl and the Three Mile Island incidents. The re-emergence of uranium as a source of sustainable energy and the increased presence of Canadian and U.S. groups active in the wider area of Nevada, lead to Great Western embarking on a quick sample survey in the fall of 2006 to assess the presence of uranium. The sample results were indeed encouraging, confirming a radioactive anomaly along the eastern edge of the lode claims, with an indicative sample taken in the area tested at 0.071% U3O8 - anything over 0.02% of Uranium Oxide is regarded as commercial. This resulted in the company extending its claims from 21 to 47 or approximately 4.0 square kilometres in the summer of 2007. The doubling of the claim area was also prompted by the successful gold/silver sampling while, on the uranium front, further results taken from four samples over a strike line of 2,000 metres, gave the following percentage values of U3O8: 0.011, 0.014, 0.05 and 0.17. Sample 4 also tested 7.75 g/t gold and 144 g/t silver.

Great Western has also uncovered two more reports prepared in 1954 and 1955 respectively, when the Cold War was at its height and the search for uranium as a source of energy was its peak. The 1954 report concluded that the area definitely contains radioactive minerals in the form of Uranophane (a calcium uranium silicate) and Uraninite (uranium oxide). Even though the 1954 report was not based on a systematic group of assays; the cut rock samples taken have indicated uranium content from 9 out of 12 samples. The values were 0.11%, 0.32%, 0.05%, 0.52%, 0.66%, 0.46%, 0.13%, 0.47% and 0.24% uranium. The 1955 report focused on another set of samples (10 in particular) to compare with previous sampling results and to confirm that uranium followed the lead mineralization present in a proportionate manner. The samples values were 0.11%, 0.24%, 0.03%, 0.01%, 0.03%, 0.69%, 0.66%, 0.47% and 0.13% of uranium.

The 1954 and 1955 reports have increased the company’s confidence that there are commercial quantities of uranium in the claim area. The results of the latest round of testing for uranium on its Ming Toy and Cabin Rock prospects released on October 25th 2007, included 15 samples with very encouraging results: 0.17%, 0.028%, 0.146%, 0.076%, 0.490%, 0.248%, 0.204%, 0.068%, 0.292%, 0.061%, 0.043%, 0.212%, 0.596%, 0.138%, 0.564% uranium content (U3O8 content in percentage).

The stated strategy of Great Western is to define a commercial resource on its acreage and then joint venture or sell to a large nuclear power group such as General Electric, Arriva and Western Electric – it does not intend to become a uranium producer by itself.

On adjoining claims there is active exploration underway from two companies:  USO Uranium Ltd (Toronto) and MSM Resources LLC (U.S.A).

Yesterday’s gold and silver results give increased confidence that Great Western sits on a commercial prospect although at this stage more work needs to be undertaken to prove that thesis. We await the next set of uranium results which are due imminently with keen interest. If they continue to show the presence of commercial grades of U308 then there will be a strong case for accelerating the exploration.  The company’s objective is clear. Having already established a base at Marietta, approximately 2 miles from the site and with further geological systematic exploration work currently undertaken at the Ming Toy fault, the aim is to determine the depth, strike length and degree of decline of the discovery formation. The company aims to delineate the length, width and depth of the ore body in order to determine what the resource would be for gold, silver and uranium.

Once this happens, the company aims to prove the Resources and Reserves in place and establish the commercial viability of the project with the view of attracting interest of majors to come and develop the project further either through a joint venture with a Great Western free carry interest or an outright acquisition of the claim rights.

Encouraged by recent exploration results in both gold/silver and uranium fronts, Great Western has engaged the services of a consulting mining and geological engineering firm to expedite a detailed ‘Competent Persons Report’ on the current prospects under the licence area. With an experienced management team let by veteran Emmett O’Connell and sufficient cash to fund its exploration needs for at least 12 months we view Great  Western as an interesting prospect and with the uranium news keenly awaited the shares are, at 29.75p, a  speculative buy.