Pantoro has reported significant high-grade gold mineralisation at its Scotia underground mine in Western Australia, demonstrating its potential to become a large-scale underground mine.
Recent grade control drilling and ore development activities have identified multiple zones of wide, high-grade gold, with mineralisation extending beyond the current ore reserve.
“Scotia continues to demonstrate the potential to be a long-life, large-scale underground mine,” Pantoro managing director Paul Cmrlec said.
“Our immediate focus is on transitioning Scotia from a predominantly development-driven operation to a production-focused mine, with steady-state operations targeted by the end of the March 2025 quarter as previously guided.”
Pantoro has completed 83 grade control drill holes in the central and southern sections of the Scotia orebody, returning strong results including:
- 51m at 12.09 grams per tonne (g/t) gold
- 51m at 23.57 g/t gold
- 4m at 7.82 g/t gold.
The company has commenced stope drilling to build drilled stocks ahead of full production, while ongoing grade control drilling continues in areas scheduled for near-term development.
“At the same time, we are continuing grade control drilling in areas scheduled for near-term development and preparing to significantly increase extensional exploration activities as additional underground drilling platforms become available,” Cmrlec said.
“We remain confident in Scotia’s long-term growth potential and its role as a high potential driver in our strategy to increase production to [more than] 200,000 ounces per annum in the medium term through the addition of underground mining operations.”
Development in the first three levels at Scotia has confirmed the anticipated wide gold zones within the ore reserve, while also identifying multiple extensions to the mine plan.
The company is advancing ore development on the 5106 level and constructing a new level access at the 5086 level.
Additionally, the link drive between the central and northern zones providing access to the northern zone is on schedule to be completed in April 2025.
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