Experience gained in 1980s prepared industry for 1990s

Mining engineers at the junior and middle management levels these days are products of the late 1960s and ’70s. In earlier days, all engineers at some time worked in gold mines, large and small. With the closure of numerous large old gold mines in the ’50s, ’60s, and ’70s, especially in the northeastern Ontario, Northwestern Quebec area, many of today’s engineers (and geologists) did not have the opportunity to spend time in these valuable training grounds. Compounding this problem was the fact that with the ’60s came the transition to mechanization — everything was 4×5 metres headings and the future was ST-8s. Everyone was working in the large mines where 2,000 tonnes per day was nothing. Suddenly, along came the ’80s and every new project was a 50-cm vein, dipping at 35 degrees with 200,000 tonnes of reserves at six grams per tonne, and access through a 2-compartment shaft dating from the 1940s. To say that technical people were ill prepared is an understatement. Except for the part about the care and feeding of horses underground, the Peele’s Mining Engineers’ Handbook suddenly became the modern reference again.

Compounding the problem of inexperience among the people who were actually doing the ore reserve calculations and carrying out the feasibility studies were too many consultants who were too eager to please their clients and too few operations people involved in the go-ahead decisions on mining projects.

It is an unfortunate fact of life that there will always be independent consultants who do not have the internal fortitude or discipline to tell a client what he should be told rather than what the client wants to hear. Similarly, accountants and lawyers, unfortunately, seem more and more to be the people in the decision-making seats these days. Many prospectors and promoters, although absolutely vital to the growth and success of our industry, are not technically equipped to prepare feasibility studies and properly judge their conclusions.

The best cure for inexperience is experience. We in the profession are a lot better equipped as mining people going into the ’90s than we were going into the ’80s. The experience has been painful for some, expensive of others but, hopefully, we have all learned some lessons.005 0000,0506 Graham Clow is senior mining engineer with Strathcona Mineral Services, Ltd., Toronto, Ont.