International mining

The Geller effect on exploration

Having dabbled in mining in the past, with some

success, Uri Geller has now become formally involved in

mineral exploration

By John Chadwick

One of the most unusual developments in the field of mineral exploration is the recent formation in London,

England, of Uri Geller Associates (UGA). The new company brings together the peculiar talents of Uri Geller and the minerals industry expertise of professional engineers and geologists from around the world. This has not come totally ‘out-of-the-blue’. Uri Geller has been interested, and active, in the mining industry for some years.

Geller has long been a figure of controversy, with the massed ranks of converted and sceptics ever eager to argue with him and about him. What is certain is that he possesses powers that can only be described as amazing, that volumes of learned scientific papers have been written about him and his talents, and that no one, including Geller himself, really understands how or why the things that happen in his presence do so. Nevertheless, there are many great scientific minds, learned and responsible people, influential people, and people in the mining industry that have been convinced by ‘The Geller Effect’.

Significantly, the man who first got Geller interested in the mining industry, in the early 1970s, was Sir Val Duncan, then chairman of Rio Tinto-Zinc Ltd. In his youth Geller had dabbled in dowsing (without knowing what he was doing); back in Israel he had helped Moshe Dayan find archeological artefacts. Sir Val, however, a dowser himself, taught Geller a more valuable use for his talents.

Dowsing of course has been around since Agricola’s time and there are references in De Re Metallica (1556) in which it is described as a means of prospecting for mineral lodes. Dowsing is a little-understood sensory process that is better developed in some individuals than

“We [UGA] will combine the conventional strengths that we can put forward with, of course, my unconventional strengths.
We are getting into a new era now, the 1990s and yes there is fraud and there are charlatans, but you have to find the real ones, that can really help.”

in others. It is still used by many companies, though as with the use of Geller’s powers, many are afraid to admit it

for fear of ridicule. Dowsing is widely used in the Soviet Union, where it is described as the biophysical method, for geological purposes. The U.S. Bureau of Mines defines it as “to supposedly locate and delineate formations bearing water, oil, or mineral by use of a divining rod or other nonscientific contraption.”

The subject of dowsing was re-investigated recently in a major article in the

New Scientist, 19 March 1987.

Locating coal

Geller first met Sir VaI Duncan in 1973 and they met on several more occasions in 1974 and 1975. A few months after their first meeting, Geller was in South Africa on a lecture tour where he met Clive Menell, chairman of the board of Anglovaal. He was invited to Menell’s home and then his office where, in Geller’s words², they rolled out a huge map on a table, asking me to have a look at it and tell them which was the area with the best coal deposits. Sir Val had already explained to me that some dowsers could work just as well from maps as they could on site, so I spread out my hands and moved them around in the air above the map until I felt that magnetic sensation on one of my palms. I then scanned the area directly underneath with a fingertip, and pointed to one specific location, which the geologists marked. “In its issue of January 28, 1980, Newsweek reported that Menell had confirmed that Geller had pointed to a strip of land near the Zimbabwe border and insisted that there was something there.Newsweek further stated that “since then, notes Menell, miners have discovered large deposits of coal in that area.”

In 1983 Geller was given a contract to find gold in Brazil, by a Japanese corporation which he has agreed not to name. The contract that was eventually arranged was for a six-year period with an immediate down-payment of $1 million and another $1 million on completion.

Geller explains how he goes about such a task. Remote sensing, as I practise it, involves very intense concentration over a long period. Before I visit a prospecting area, I study the maps I have been given for at least two hours a day, sometimes more. I memorise their main features, so that I will recognise them when I am flying over them later. I do regular spells of map-dowsing, much as Sir Val Duncan taught me to do, but using my bare hands instead of a pendulum and waiting to feel those magnetic sensations on my palms or fingertips. Sometimes these come quickly, sometimes not, but eventually I find myself zeroing in on certain regions which I mark in pencil. I check these over again for days or even weeks, to make sure that my impressions remain the same.

When they do, I feel very confident, and mark the areas to be flown over on site for some aerial hand-dowsing, and eventually to be tramped over inch by inch for the ‘fine-tuning’ and the location of exact spots. When they do not, I simply keep going until either the impressions come or I feel that there is nothing to find.

The [Japanese] corporation eventually examined several of the areas I marked on the maps the they gave me, and a number of these are, I hope, now producing gold.

The sparkle of diamonds

In 1985 Geller was contacted by Peter Stirling, chairman of Zanex Ltd., who had some interesting gold mining leases

in the Solomon Islands. In October 1985, Zanex, in a statement issued to stockholders, reported that as a result of advice given by one of Uri Geller’s companies, the exploration thrust was being expanded to include a search for diamonds on a previously unexplored island. A sample taken from one of the locations that Geller had indicated on the map, was analysed at Melboume University and the report came back “the sample indicated a high prospectivity of the rocks from that area for diamond-bearing host rocks.”

As a result of his work in the Solomons, Peter Stirling gave Geller an open testimonial letter in which he wrote “I confirm that Zanex is about to commence exploration in areas outlined by you in Solomon Islands. The most interesting area identified to date is on Malaita Island where upon your instructions we are about to commence a search for gold and diamonds. We have already confirmed the presence of Kimberlite which could be diamondiferous in this area. Other areas will be investigated in due course.”

The conventional and the unconventional in exploration. Uri Geller checking on exploration drilling work.

The new company

At this point it should be mentioned that two members of UGA are Tony Hammond, a mining engineer and amateur

dowser, and Dennis Thomas, the owner and managing director of Hunter Personnel (UK). Both have wide international mining experience.

All this indication of Geller’s potential value to the mining industry, and the launch of UGA merited further investigation:

IM: How did Uri Geller Associates come about?

Uri Geller: Believe it or not it was not my idea, it was Tony Hammond’s. I was in retirement here, enjoying the easy life, Tony telephoned me and then came to see me. And I thought here’s something, maybe I’m meant to do it. If we do make a lot of money, a large part of it will go to charity. If we can do four or five big deals a year and find mineral deposits, it will be a very positive thing. Tony introduced me to Dennis Thomas and the reason they excited me is because, until today I was relying totally on my own abilities and so forth, but I had also learnt that I need engineers, I need geologists around me because I can get their feedback. They could direct me closer to the target area.

IM: So you are interested in finding the large deposits, not the small ones?

Uri Geller: Exactly, I’m looking for big deals.

IM: You would start a UGA contract with map work?

Uri Geller: Companies would send maps and tell us what they are looking for, and some agreement would be reached. I’m not saying that in each case we are going to take a million dollars because theymight he small companies that we will ask for royalties. So once we have come to an agreement and they send over the maps, that’s when we all get together. Then we study the terrain, we go to libraries, we go to archives, we go to the computer and we start gathering information. Then we will try to condense this information to the areas in which they are looking. Then I just do my thing, for four weeks I will work on the maps, about three hours everyday, and then I’ll start marking places. What we will do is facsimile the maps back. If the areas are close [to where the exploration company thought there might be potential] then the next step is to go out to the field. Arrangements will be made to hire either helicopters or small planes. They must be low-flying, slow aeroplanes, which are usually twin-engined ‘props’. Then we fly over the area. It depends how big it is. If it’s a very large area, it will take a few days to fly over. If it’s a small area, we can even drive across it. Then I do my real work. That’s when I really sense, and then that’s finally where I will mark [areas worthy of follow-up exploration].

Then the other part of what we do is saving companies’ money, by advising them where they would be wasting exploration money. I once told a company three places not to drill, and they drilled, and they lost $50 million.

IM: When you say don’t drill somewhere, is that definite, never go back there?

Uri Geller: Definitely, because I don’t feel the ore, I don’t feel anything. In many instances you must understand that, for instance, there is gold where I point, but not in commercial value.

IM: You can say that there is gold, or what ever is the target mineral, but that at the moment it is not of commercial value?

Uri Geller: Yes, most of the time.

IM: Would you be influenced by the engineers and geologists that you work with?

Uri Geller: Very positively, but I might also think that what they are saying is totally wrong, so I’ll stick to what I feel. But that’s why Tony and Dennis are good for me because they can direct me to geological clues that I don’t know. So that’s where their expertise will come in, which will cut down the time for me and also might make our decisions faster – much faster. We will combine the conventional strengths that we can put forward with, of course, my unconventional strengths.

Uri Geller at the Zanex plant in the Solomon Islands.

IM: I foresee problems with the conservatism of the mining industry .

Uri Geller: You have three sections as I see it, ‘big business’, ‘politics’ and ‘military’. ‘Politics’ and ‘military’ use me for different purposes. The question is why, ‘big business’ does not use me or people like me? Well, it’s beginning to happen. I now lecture with Henry Kissinger, Gerald Ford and Alexander Haig on the same podium. We lecture to businessmen, to the YPO -Young Presidents Organisation. They are the chairmen of the largest companies in the world and they listen. Every successful businessman has a power, something that made him. That’s why I think that mining companies had better start listening. If they throw out $100 million a year on exploration and find nothing, what is it to pay $1 million to someone who might deliver something. Some companies spend that sort of money just to justify to their shareholders that they are doing something.

A lot of companies also use me to find what is good to buy up [other companies or their potential prospects]. The thing is to use it now [such powers]. We are getting into a new era now, the 1990s, and yes there is fraud and there are charlatans, of course there are, inevitably there are, but you have to find the real ones, that can really help. Can you imagine that a man like Sir Val Duncan dared? [to put his faith in Geller].

If we [UGA] start working together, we will ask the companies not to hide the facts. If we find something, or if we miss and we don’t find anything, we want it known, we don’t want to be working secretly. When Tony contacted me I said let’s do it. Suddenly I was flush with ideas and I thought ‘this is where I stop doing it secretly’. However, if client companies insist on confidentiality we would of course, adhere to such a request.

Geller demonstrated his technique by finding a gold ring secreted in the top of a foolscap envelope under a pile of papers, on a desk covered in papers. I close my eyes and I do this [stretches out his left arm],I believe that my hand is only a tool, its nothing to do with my hand, I can also probably go like that [folds his arms], but I’m not used to doing it that way, I’m just used to doing it with stretched hands. When I close my eyes I visualise a sort of television screen and when I come over the area of whatever I am looking for, psychologically I feel like a magnetism or two magnets opposing each other. [He quickly discounts, correctly, most of the table area]. Here [Geller points to the envelope, his eyes are still closed], it feels like I’m moving my hand through a denseness and when I come close, I feel a sort of pull I may be wrong but is this where the ring is? [He points to the exact spot].

It would seem that if Uri Geller’s powers are as potent as they appear to be, his contribution to an exploration programme could be to direct follow-up prospecting to precise areas, without expending vast sums on preliminary exploration. It will take a brave company to go to its shareholders and say that it is using Uri Geller to assist with exploration, but, though conservative, the mining industry has often taken bold measures to ensure its continued profitability, particularly in recent, less buoyant markets.

Fact or fiction? – only those mining companies that use, or have used, Geller’s services can answer that question. It seems hardly creditable that he could have fooled so many, clever, responsible, successful people and it seems certain that his powers merit serious trial in exploration.

Anyone wanting further information should contact Uri Geller Associates via the main web page https://urigeller.com/

References and further reading

1. A dictionary of mining. mineral and related terms. U.S. Bureau of Mines. 1968.

2. Uri Geller and Guy Lyon Playfair, The Geller Effect, Johnathan Cape, 1986.

3. Uri Geller, My Story. Robson/Warner, 1975.

4. Uri Geller, Uri Geller’s Fortune Secrets, Sphere, June 1987.

5. Charles Panati, editor, The Geller Papers. Houghton Mifflin Company.