Massive exploration drilling at Detour Lake should lengthen mine’s longevity
Kirkland Lake Gold is sitting pretty to reach its 2020 gold production targets, thanks to a record second quarter.
In a July 12 news release, the Toronto gold miner said, collectively, its three operations at Macassa in Kirkland Lake; Detour Lake, north of Cochrane, and Fosterville in Australia, produced a total of 379,195 ounces, up 15 per cent from the same quarter last year and up 25 per cent from the first quarter this year.
Gold sales reached an average realized price of $1,814 per ounce. Up to the midway point of 2021, production totalled 682,042 ounces, a 3 per cent increase from the first half of 2020, reflecting higher production at Detour Lake and Macassa.
A new strategic partnership and equity investment by Kirkland Lake Gold (TSX: KL; NYSE: KL; ASX: KLA) into Orefinders Resources (ORX: TSXV) and Mistango River Resources (CSE: MIS) will allow the two Canadian juniors to “unlock the full potential of their assets,” says Stephen Stewart, CEO of Orefinders and chairman of Mistango.
Under the proposed partnership agreement, Kirkland Lake Gold has acquired a 9.9% stake in each of the juniors. Additionally, Kirkland Lake will also have the option to acquire up to a 75% interest in specific projects under the companies’ portfolio of assets in exchange for a total combined $120 million investment.
This is the second high-profile investment that Orefinders and Mistango have received in the last year as billionaire investor, and former chairman of Kirkland Lake Gold, Eric Sprott has made four separate investments into the two companies over that period.
Gold miner takes ownership stake, sign option agreements with Orefinders Resources, Mistango River Resources
Kirkland Lake Gold has taken an ownership position in two gold exploration sister companies in the Kirkland Lake camp and is prepared to spend up to $120 million on exploration.
In what’s being framed as a strategic partnership and a potential joint venture opportunity, Kirkland Lake Gold is acquiring a 9.9 per cent interest in Orefinders Resources and Mistango River Resources. Both junior companies are under the direction of Stephen Stewart.
Orefinders is sending 24.4 million common shares Kirkland Lake Gold’s way in return for more than $2.4 million.
It has come to our attention that Kirkland Lake’s Town Council will, during their meeting on the afternoon of 20 April 2021, be voting on a proposal to divest the Town of the whole of the property containing the historic heritage building known as the Sir Harry Oakes Chateau and placing the future of the Museum of Northern History in jeopardy.
WHEREAS, the Museum of Northern History at the Sir Harry Oakes Chateau has been a part of the Kirkland Lake community for decades; AND,
WHEREAS, the Museum of Northern History at the Sir Harry Oakes Chateau is the cultural centre of the Town of Kirkland Lake, now acting as the single permanent hub of cultural identity and activity for the community and surrounding area; AND,
An accidental discovery of gold that helped establish one of Canada’s most valuable mining camps and important newspapers
When William Henry “Bill” Wright came across a visible gold vein in Kirkland Lake in 1911, he could not have known that the deposit he had just found would become one of Canada’s most prosperous mining camps, home to seven gold mines.
Wright was born in the English town of Sleaford in 1876. He worked as a butcher’s apprentice before joining the British army in 1897, serving both at home and abroad during the Second Boer War.
He came to Canada 10 years later, and worked odd jobs in northern Ontario before going to the Cobalt and Porcupine mining camps. Along with his brother-in-law Ed Hargreaves, Wright headed to the Kirkland Lake region, where prospectors had previously searched for gold. They spent much of their time hunting for food as well as searching for promising ground to stake.
In spite of the warnings that Northern Ontario would die “as soon as the ore runs out,” in my heart I always rejected that feeling of impermanence. The Pollyanna in me thinks there is still a bright future on the horizon.
In 1903, silver deposits were discovered in Cobalt. It was likely the most significant event in the history of Northern Ontario. At that time, the area was uninhabited wilderness.
By 1910, more than 3,000 men were employed in underground mining; the population of the town was 6,000 and nearby Haileybury had a population of 5,000. Depending on various sources, there were between 38 mines and/or 100 mines or mining companies in the Cobalt area.
Pandemic-related challenges faced by the Kirkland Lake Gold team in 2020 have left the big boss suitably impressed. In reflecting on the past year, president-CEO Tony Makuch was pleased with the “solid results” in gold production in releasing the company’s fourth-quarter and full-year results.
The Toronto-headquartered gold miner reported all three of its cornerstone mines at Macassa and Detour Lake in northeastern Ontario, and Fosterville in Australia, achieved their highest production rates in the last quarter of 2020.
“Looking at our operating performance, in many respects our team had its best year ever in 2020,” said Makuch in a Jan. 12 news release.
Kirkland Lake Gold views Timmins as an integral part of the company’s future according to its president and chief executive officer Tony Makuch.
Makuch, a native of Timmins, has more than 30 years of experience as a mining engineer. He joined KL Gold in July 2016. Before that, he was the CEO of Lake Shore Gold from 2008 until 2016, when it was acquired by Tahoe Resources.
This past week, he was the guest speaker for the latest edition of The State of Mining — a series of discussions hosted by the Timmins Chamber of Commerce over the video conferencing platform Zoom.
The Kirkland Lake area remains hot property for many junior miners drilling or acquiring property in the Abitibi region of northeastern Ontario. Meanwhile a cobalt plant developer is finetuning its strategy to bring a mothballed refinery back into production in the Temiskaming area.
Toronto’s Mistango River Resources started a 10,000-metres drilling campaign on its Kirkland West Project, just west of Kirkland Lake Gold’s Macassa Mine.
The plan is to explore multiple target areas on the property with the first holes going in near the former Baldwin Mine, where historical production yielded gold grades of 15 grams per tonne.
Gold production in Ontario in Q2 2020 declined by 17% over Q2 2019 due to suspensions related to COVID-19 crisis. Detour Lake was the largest gold mine in Ontario.
Ontario is the largest gold-producing Canadian province or territory. According to the Ontario Mining Association, the region produced 73,733 kilograms of gold in 2019, which equates to 2,371 thousand troy ounces of gold, or 42% of total gold produced in Canada.
Based on available quarterly corporate reports, Ontario produced 528 kozt of gold in Q2 2020 from primary gold mines and as a by-product of base metals and platinum group metals operations. This significant 17% decline over the corresponding period of 2019 (638 kozt) was primarily caused by suspensions related to COVID-19 crisis.
Exploration drilling at Macassa Mine continue to produce spectacular grades for Kirkland Lake Gold.
The Toronto-headquartered mining company released drill results from its exploration program in Kirkland Lake where the focus is on growing gold reserves at its South Mine Complex and finding more high-grade gold further out and deeper down along the unexplored zones around the Amalgamated Break.
In an Oct. 19 news release, the company said it’s seeing “extremely high-grade intersections” from its program to extend the South Mine Complex to the east and west, in identifying high-grade mineralization along the Amalgamated Break, and in identifying a new, high-grade corridor along Main Break near the location of its new No. 4 shaft.
Gatling Resources has connected three high-grade deposits at its Larder Gold Project in northeastern Ontario, and can prove it’s all part of one large mineralized system.
The Vancouver junior miner claims it has successfully drilled gold mineralization between its Fernland and Cheminis deposits.
The company’s Larder Project hosts three high-grade gold deposits – Bear, Cheminis and Fernland – along the Cadillac-Larder Lake Break, 35 kilometres east of Kirkland Lake.
Gatling Exploration contracts Windfall Geotek to dig through the data
Artificial intelligence (AI) will play a role in helping Gatling Exploration chase down some gold targets near the established mining camp of Kirkland Lake.
The Vancouver junior miner has engaged AI experts, Windfall Geotek, to use its advanced Computer Aided Resource Detection System (CARDS) to identify targets at the company’s Larder Gold project, 35 kilometres east of Kirkland Lake in McVittie and McGarry Townships.
Gatling said in a July 30 release that the targets will be evaluated and then explored using more traditional exploration techniques.
Who says mining is not sustainable? The recent announcement by IAMGOLD to start building a Cda $2 billion Cote Lake open-pit gold mine 140 km north of Sudbury — which will employ 1,000 workers during peak construction and roughly 450 full-time middle-class jobs — is welcome news. The mine life is expected to be around 18 years; however, ongoing exploration may extend the life of mine.
Vale’s Creighton Mine, which started production in 1901, is still going strong 8,000 feet below the surface. The deeper the company goes, the richer the nickel/copper and PGM content of the ore gets.
Kirkland Lake’s Macassa gold mine started production in 1933. With new discoveries at deeper levels and a roughly $320 million investment for a new mine shaft, Kirkland Lake Gold’s CEO Tony Makuch is extending the mine’s life for another 30 to 40 years.
Who says mining is not sustainable? The recent announcement by IAMGOLD to start building a C$2 billion Cote Lake open pit gold mine 140 km north of Sudbury which will employ 1,000 workers during peak construction and roughly 450 full-time middle-class jobs is welcome news. The mine life is expected to be around 18 years, however, ongoing exploration may extend the life of mine.
Vale’s Creighton mine which started production in 1901, is still going strong 8,000 feet below surface. The deeper the company goes, the richer the nickel/copper and PGM content of the ore gets. Kirkland Lake’s Macassa gold mine started production in 1933. With new discoveries at deeper levels and a roughly $320 million investment for a new mine shaft, Kirkland Lake Gold’s CEO Tony Makuch is extending the mine’s life for another 30 to 40 years!
Northern Ontario’s mining camps have seen many mines whose lifespans have lasted 50 years or much longer while hundreds of others with shorter operations have still provided tens of thousands of jobs and billions in economic activity for the Ontario economy over the past century.
Meanwhile car manufacturing at Oshawa’s General Motors plant started in 1907 and unfortunately closed in 2018, dealing a devastating blow to southern Ontario’s auto-focused economy. Similarly, in 2011, Ford Motor Company permanently closed its St. Thomas assembly plant that opened in 1967. Now there are rumour’s that Ford may be closing its giant auto assembly plant in Oakville.