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Chariot Race Staff writer Anthony Vaccaro travelled to the swaths of desert stretching alongside the southern Peruvian coast to see first-hand one of the largest copper deposits discovered in Peru during the past decade. |
| The Marcona copper project's combination of robust mineralization and ideal location has Chariot Resources' president and chief executive, Ulli Rath, thinking big. Chariot is simultaneously conducting feasibility and environmental impact studies, as well as lining up financing, all to make sure that the mine cashes in on copper's historic bull run -- if it doesn't become a takeover target. The following are some images from Mr. Vaccaro's site visit. |
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La Nueva Revolucion Jalisco state has not witnessed much mining the since Mexican Revolution. Soltoro and Western Silver hope to change that |
| When talk turns to mining in Mexico, Jalisco doesn't have the historical cachet of Durango or the copper-fed importance of Sonora. But this state on the Pacific coast, long neglected by exploration companies, has good geology, good infrastructure, and one of the best economic environments in the country -- all the right ingredients for success. Two Canadian juniors, Soltoro and Southern Silver Exploration are on the ground floor in Jalisco, bringing some modern exploration techniques to a mining district that was fairly quiet for most of the 20th century. Senior staff writer James Whyte visited Jalisco and took these pictures. His story is in the June 18-24 issue of The Northern Miner. |
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The High Point High River Gold's Taparko nearing production in Burkina Faso |
| High River Gold first visited West Africa's Burkina Faso in 1993, when it entered into a joint venture for the Taparko gold property, situated roughly 200 km by paved road northeast of the capital, Ouagadougou. These days Taparko is almost ready to go into production at a rate of 100,000 oz. gold per year in its first year – and should reach 140,000 oz. in year two. Staff writer Anthony Vaccaro recently visited Taparko and these are some of his photos. |
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Lisbon Valley genes With the resurgence in the price of uranium, Universal Uranium has returned to one of the most prolific uranium mining districts in the U.S. -- Utah's famed Lisbon Valley. |
| The district was once home to 16 uranium mines, which produced more than 103 million lbs. of U3O8. Prospector Charlie Steen was responsible for igniting the first uranium boom in the district back in the early '50s with his discovery of the Mi Vida mine. By hiring his son, Mark Steen, as the company's senior technical advisor, Universal hopes there is still some luck left in those Steen genes. Staff writer Anthony Vacarro travelled to Utah to check on Universal's good fortune. These are his photographs. |
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Lapland luxury Agnico-Eagle diversifies with Finnish gold mine |
| Agnico-Eagle owns Canada’s largest gold deposit –- the LaRonde gold mine in the Abitibi region of Quebec, about 650 km northwest of Montreal. With 18 years of production already in the books and reserves of 5.3 million oz. gold, a company could grow content watching a blue-chip asset like LaRonde yield seemingly endless ounces of yellow metal. Not Agnico-Eagle. Well aware of its dearth of likely producers in the pipeline, Agnico sought the luxury of diversification. And in the fall of 2005, it acquired the outstanding shares of Finnish miner Riddarhyttan Resources and its 2.3-million-oz. Kittila gold project (another 1.2 million oz. are in the resource category). T.N.M. staff writer Anthony Vaccaro travelled to Finnish Lapland, 1,000 km north of Helsinki, for an update on Kittila’s development. His story appears in the July 7-13/06 issue. |
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Channelling golden ghosts Joint-venture partners hope for more Cochenour gold |
| A joint venture of Exall Resources and Southern Star Resources is drilling deep targets beneath the Bruce Channel of Red Lake in northwestern Ontario, testing what the companies believe is the southwestern extension of the Cochenour orebody (the Cochenour Willans mine last closed in 1991). The Northern Miner visited the property in May -- finding it mercifully free of blackflies. The story appears in our June 23-29/06 issue and a photo gallery of the visit is available here. |
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Alexis goes two camp Alexis Minerals believes there’s another gold mine in Val d’Or |
| If the best place to find a mine is indeed in the shadow of a headframe, perhaps the odds favour Alexis Minerals. The company is poking around behind some 20 headframes in the historic Val d’Or mining camp of northwestern Quebec. Alexis owns 212-sq.-km in the camp and boasts eight past-producing gold and base metal mines. In 2004, Alexis signed an option deal to acquire a combined 17 gold and base metal properties from Aur Resources. The 110-sq.-km package straddles 25 km of strike extension of the favourable Val d’Or formation, host to the formerly producing Louvicourt, Dunraine No. 4, Manitou-Barvue and Louvem base metal deposits. More recently, Alexis consolidated ownership of the Aurbel property along with the 1,400 tonne-per-day Aurbel gold mill. The property hosts the advanced Lac Herbin quartz-vein gold project. Staff writer Ryan Walker recently visited the historic camp in northwestern Quebec and these are his photos. |
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PGM Ventures - Aguas Tenidas |
| With a feasibility study in hand, major financing lined up, and new technical staff on board, Toronto-based junior PGM Ventures (PPG-V) is well on its way to re-opening its wholly owned Aguas Tenidas underground zinc-copper mine, located in 110 km northwest of Seville, in Spain’s portion of the famed Iberian Pyrite Belt. Production is tentatively slated to resume late next year, with Aguas Tenidas capable of annually cranking out concentrate containing 50,000 tonnes zinc, 24,000 tonnes copper plus by-product lead, silver and gold for at least 13 years. The Northern Miner editor John Cumming visited the project in early 2005 and provided an in-depth, updated report on the project in our May 12-18, 2006, issue. Here are photos from his visit. |
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Diamond in the rough? Miners seek treasure under Mugabe’s shadow |
| Despite its vast mineral resources, Zimbabwe has largely fallen off the radar of the international investment community. The regime of President Robert Mugabe has put a dark cloud over the country's economy, and a proposed new mining policy that would require foreign companies to hand over 51% of their operations -- half of which would come without any compensation - points to even darker days ahead. The Northern Miner visited Zimbabwe to see how business was getting done inside the country’s borders. |
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Let them mine cake Companies search for uranium ore outside Canada and Australia |
| With uranium prices finding ever loftier perches, and analysts predicting more nuclear reactors needed to supply the energy demands of a burgeoning global population, the race to find new sources of the yellow cake is heating up under the desert sun of Namibia. The country is one of sub-Saharan Africa's more stable regions, and it now finds itself in the crosshairs of the world’s uranium seekers. Staff writer Anthony Vaccaro visited some of Namibia’s uranium projects and his resulting story appeared in our March 3-9, 2006 issue. |
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A Swede deal Gold-Ore has fingers crossed for more gold at Sweden’s Bjorkdal mine |
| When the attitude toward mining and exploration in Latin America headed south, Vancouver-based Gold-Ore decided it best head in the opposite direction. The junior charted a course north and found itself in the Vasterbotten district of Sweden, 750 km above Stockholm. The area is known for its volcanogenic massive sulphide and lode gold deposits, most notably the Boliden deposit, which produced more than 3 million oz. gold between 1926 and 1967. The area is also host to the Bjorkdal mine, which Gold-Ore recently optioned from AIM-listed Minmet. The mine produced 31,000 oz. gold from stockpiles in 2004 but ounces are thinning and Gold-Ore hopes the Bjorkdal camp has still more gold to give. Senior staff writer Rob Robertson visited the camp and these are some of his photographs. His story appears in the Jan. 27-Feb. 2, 2006 issue of The Northern Miner. |
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Silver lining Break Creek Mining unearths what could be a 300-million-oz. silver deposit |
| Senior staff writer Rob Robertson had heard whispers about Bear Creek Mining’s massive Corani silver-lead-zinc project in southern Peru. Some said “it’s Navidad without the lawsuit,” while others described it as “another San Cristobal.” Robertson travelled to Peru to get a first-hand look at one of the biggest South American silver finds in recent memory. Stories from his trip appear in the Dec. 23-29, 2005, issue of The Northern Miner. Robertson explains what makes this project unique and compares it with similar development-stage projects such as Navidad and San Cristobal. Here are some photos from his visit. |
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A fortune in San Cristobal Apex Silver hopes for silver lining in Bolivia’s changing political climate |
| With national elections on the way, and whispers that a new government could nationalize Bolivia’s oil assets, Apex Silver continues to build its US$650-million San Cristobal silver-lead-zinc project. Staff writer Anthony Vaccaro travelled recently to Bolivia and his story appears in the Dec. 9-15, 2005, issue of The Northern Miner. These are photos from Vaccaro’s trip. |
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The long run Marathon PGM expands resource at Port Coldwell |
| The Northern Miner visited Marathon PGM's polymetallic project, in the Port Coldwell igneous complex near Marathon, Ont., this autumn. The copper-nickel-palladium deposit, first discovered by Anaconda Copper in the 1960s, has been around the block before, but Marathon PGM's approach, depending heavily on traditional exploration, has turned up several new mineralized zones south of the previously known resources on the property. The story appeared in the Dec. 9 issue of The Northern Miner. |
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I Love Luxi Sparton Resources explores Yunnan's Luxi gold belt |
| The Northern Miner Editor John Cumming travelled to the most southwestern part of China's Yunnan province, near the border with Myanmar, to visit Sparton Resources' (YRI-V) grassroots Luxi (pronounced "Loo-shee") gold-exploration project. |
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Hello Moto Congo welcomes Aussie junior |
| The Northern Miner staff writer Anthony Vaccaro recently travelled to the Democratic Republic of the Congo to visit several gold properties held by Perth, Australia-based Moto Goldmines. |
