Rackla’s Lentung Project now fully permitted for 2026 exploration – Richard Mills

2026.06.01

Rackla Metals (TSXV: RAK) has obtained the final permit allowing it to conduct exploration on its Lentung tungsten project, located in the Canadian Northwest Territories.

The company on May 21 announced that that it has obtained a five-year Type A land use permit from the Sahtu Land and Water Board.

The permit allows for the establishment of a 49-person camp, a drill program, and the repair, maintenance and use of trails and access routes at Lentung. The Lentung Project is now fully permitted for the upcoming 2026 exploration season.

Rackla plans 10,000m drill program at Lentung tungsten property — Richard Mills

Lentung Project

The project is located within the Tombstone Tungsten Belt of the western Northwest Territories and is approximately 60 km by road north of the past-producing Cantung tungsten mine.

Between 1977 and 1982, Union Carbide Exploration Corporation conducted a comprehensive exploration program on the Lentung property (previously called Lened) which included 26,900 meters of diamond drilling, geochemical and geophysical surveys, detailed geological mapping, trenching, metallurgical, engineering, economic and environmental studies.

In 1982, Union Carbide submitted the project to the Federal Environmental Assessment and Review Process (EARP) seeking a mine permit. However, due to declining tungsten prices, the company withdrew the application and paused all activities at the site. There has been no significant work on the site since then.

Rackla has acquired the original Union Carbide files including original drill logs, assay sheets, mylar maps, metallurgical, environmental, resource, economic and geophysical studies.

Since December, the company has been scanning the files, performing Optical Character Recognition (OCR) and digitizing of the data. This data was incorporated in 3D modeling software and will be used to help define the 2026 drill program for quality checks and resource confirmation. The drill core from the 1970’s and 1980’s drill campaigns remained on the property and Rackla is planning for recovery and re-sampling in the summer of 2026.

The review of the files to date has shown a quality dataset that is confirming a robust deposit with high-grade open pit potential. The historical resource estimate by Union Carbide was calculated for only three of the 15 tungsten occurrences on the Lened property and ranks as one of the highest-grade tungsten skarn deposits in the world according to the US Geological Survey (USGS). Lened/ Lentung is located in a region hosting world-class tungsten deposits including the past-producing Cantung mine and the Mactung deposit (Figure 1).

The tungsten mineralization at Lentung is hosted in altered limestone along the margins of Cretaceous alkalic (quartz monzonite) intrusions belonging to the Tungsten Suite (Lened, CAC and Rudi plutons, Figure 2). Mineralization consists of the tungsten mineral scheelite with minor copper and gold associated with the skarns. The mineral resource was calculated on the Emma, Western Skarn, and Stephen’s Ridge occurrences.

Figures 3 through 5 demonstrate the open pit potential of the mineralization.

It’s worth noting that Union Carbide’s historical mineral resource was done using a .6% cut off, which for a tungsten open pit resource done today seems extremely high, Rackla, imo, will likely use much lower cut off.

According to AI generated search results the average grade of global open pit tungsten resources evaluated today ranges from 0.11% to 0.23% WO3, while the typical cut-off grade for an economically viable open pit mine is usually between 0.05% and 0.08% WO3. Again, this type of information is not to be used for investment purposes.

With their land-use permit secured, which includes drilling permits, Rackla will twin historical drill holes and re-verify the data to produce a compliant resource calculation.

Elsewhere on the property, tungsten skarn mineralization is observed where the quartz monzonite intrusions interact with limestone-bearing units to form an additional twelve skarn occurrences. These occurrences have undergone only minor exploration and drilling and further work on these is planned to determine if they could contain additional resources.

Where the intrusions encounter carbonate rocks like limestone and dolomite, there is potential for tungsten skarn mineralization and Rackla will be exploring this potential. Table 1 lists some of the highlights from each of these other zones.

2026 exploration

Rackla’s 2026 plans for the Lentung Project are to:

• Establish a new 49-person camp.

• Complete 4,000m of diamond drilling by twinning 27 holes to confirm Union Carbide results and to bring their findings up to a modern standard.

• Complete 6,000m of reverse circulation drilling to further define the known occurrences.

• Conduct surface trenching to expose shallowly buried tungsten bodies.

• Clear and repair the 25 km of existing roads and trails on site and the access trail to the Howards Pass Access Road.
  
• Produce an NI 43-101 resource calculation following the exploration season.

The 2026 field program was scheduled to commence in late May.

According to Rackla, the proximity of the Lentung project to the Cantung mine presents a compelling exploration opportunity given strong tungsten prices, the growing global interest in critical minerals, and the desire for a stable, secure North American supply. The Cantung mine began production in 1962 and operated intermittently until 2015, when it shut down due to low tungsten prices. Should the Cantung mine restart, the high-grade tungsten at Lentung could contribute the re-establishment of tungsten mining in this region.

The company is working in consultation with the Sahtu Dene First Nation, the Dehcho First Nations and local communities.

“Again, we are grateful for the support and feedback we received throughout the permitting process from communities across the region, including the Dehcho First Nations and Sahtu Dene and Métis, to local organizations, regional regulators and government,” Rackla’s CEO Simon Ridgway stated in the news release. “Since staking Lentung during the 2025 exploration season and acquiring the full historical database compiled by Union Carbide, we have been keen to return the drills to the property and revitalize this world-renowned belt with a new wave of tungsten exploration. We view the Northwest Territories as a favorable jurisdiction, due to the clear and efficient permitting process that supports responsible mineral exploration, and we recognize the long-term economic opportunities exploration can bring to the region.”

Separately, Rackla reported on May 25 that it closed a previously announced non-brokered private placement financing, raising total gross proceeds of $3.44 million with the issuance of 16 million charity flow-through units at $0.215 per unit.

Management intends to use the proceeds primarily for conducting exploration and drilling on its Lentung tungsten property, and potentially for advancing the company’s other properties in the region.

Rackla’s cash position is now $13 million.

Rackla Metals Inc.
TSXV:RAK
Cdn$0.15 2026.05.29
Shares Outstanding 162.9m
Market Cap Cdn$24.9m
RAK website

Richard (Rick) Mills
aheadoftheherd.com

Subscribe to AOTH’s free newsletter

Richard does not own shares of Rackla Metals Inc. (TSXV:RAK). RAK is a paid advertiser on his site aheadoftheherd.com This article is issued on behalf of RAK