Golden Milestone for New Pajingo Mine Decline
Minjar Gold’s Pajingo operation has struck gold from a fresh major ore source as it continues to develop a new decline.
Development ore is being processed from the Steph orebody, intersected as part of the Lynne project at Pajingo, 50km south of Charters Towers.
It is a milestone for the decline project, which will provide underground access to a host of known gold deposits beyond the Vera-Nancy system that has been the mainstay of Pajingo production in recent years.
“The Lynne project is still developing the decline to the Lynne orebody, but a review of the Steph orebody and its close proximity to both the Lynne decline and the Vera-Nancy operations resulted in an accelerated development program from the Vera-Nancy side,” Pajingo gold mine general manager Dale Oram said. “Development ore is currently being hauled to surface via the Vera-Nancy decline”.
“The Lynne decline will break through to the Vera-Nancy operations in a few months and this will allow the ore from Steph to be extracted and hauled via the Lynne decline, reducing the haulage distance.”
Mr Oram said continued resource definition drilling of the Steph orebody had put it forward as a major ore source for Pajingo.
“A development drive is now progressing along the orebody in preparation for stoping in July,” he said. “Grade control drilling has increased as detailed definition of the Steph ore lodes is sourced to provide accurate modelling data for mine design and scheduling purposes.
“This is a significant addition to the Lynne project, with further drilling expected to further increase the re-source and reserve, as the orebody extents have yet to be closed off.”
Mr Oram said Minjar Gold chief executive officer Max Ji had threatened to kiss the first ore from the Lynne project and, with a Pajingo site visit corresponding with the time the Steph ore was intersected, he was keen to make true his promise. “Better than a hand shake,” he said.
