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Burbanks Mill

Auric Mining

Libre Franklin

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The West Australian by James Pearson from Bulls n Bears

Auric Mining has fired up the engines to shift first ore this week from a newly approved starter pit at the company’s flagship Munda gold mine, 5 kilometres from Widgiemooltha in Western Australia.

The company has boots on the ground and a newly leased mining fleet from MHM Contracting – to be operated by Auric - as it gears up to launch the company’s first wholly owned mining operation. A 12-person camp is up and running and earthworks are underway.

Auric has ticked a major box by securing green lights from WA’s mining regulator for its pit proposal and mine closure plan. With the approvals in hand, the company has also marked out the pit crest, haul road, waste dump, run-of-mine pads and site office.

A high-resolution grade control blitz has been completed at site, punching in 428 holes for 14,670 metres across a tight 5m by 5m grid. The program, by Kalgoorlie-based Total Drilling Services, has armed Auric with the required data to pinpoint near-surface ore blocks ahead of mining. As fresh benches are exposed, more drill testing will be conducted on the same close-spaced pattern to keep the gold pipeline flowing.

With a pre-strip ratio of 7.6:1, the starter pit has been designed as a conventional open-pit, drill-and-blast mining operation and will kick off by first removing 339,000 cubic metres of overburden.

Auric is targeting 125,000 tonnes of ore at an average 1.8 grams per tonne (g/t) and aims to process 6,100 ounces of gold at a recovery rate of 83 per cent and at an all-in sustaining cost of $2635 per ounce.

Based on a $3500 gold price, the project is expected to generate $5.3 million in quick cash flow after a capital investment of $6.5M.

However, with gold now soaring 50 per cent higher and hitting all-time highs last week at $5204 per ounce, the estimated cashflow figure pales in comparison and is likely to become significantly bigger. The starter pit is expected to wrap up in about six months, after which Auric says the company plans to roll out pit optimisation and mine planning for a significantly bigger dig with eyes firmly fixed on full-scale production by 2026.

Using a 0.5g/t cut-off, Munda hosts a mineral resource of 3.65 million tonnes at 1.23g/t for a total of 145,000 ounces of gold. At a lower cut-off of 0.2g/t gold the indicated and inferred resource jumps to 189,000 ounces.

A 2023 scoping study on Munda undertaken by Kalgoorlie-based consulting firm Minecomp found that using a base case gold price of $2600 per ounce, the mine would be able to produce 1.716Mt of ore at 2.2g/t to deliver a hefty $76.9M in undiscounted surplus cash flow.

Hot on the heels of producing more than $100M in revenues from the company’s once unloved Jeffreys Find mine near Norseman, Auric is now cashed up and appears ready to make its mark as a fully owner-operated mining company at Munda - and thus become a substantial gold producer in the district.

"Munda is our major asset containing a sizeable gold resource. We are right on schedule and have mobilised all the necessary machinery and infrastructure. Earthworks have commenced."

Auric Mining managing director Mark English.

Auric fires up first owner-operated WA gold mine