Ramping Up For A Strong Finish To The Year
Victoria Gold Corp. (TSX-V:GCX) achieved a record in mined tonnes at its Dublin Gulch gold property in the Yukon in a successful third quarter 2020 .
The company achievd gold production of 35,312 ounces and gold revenue of C$80 million at an average realised price of US$1,886 per ounce of gold.
President and CEO, John McConnell, said mining and processing activities continued to ramp up toward full production during the third quarter of 2020.
“This has been another strong quarter for operations at Eagle particularly given the increased challenges of ramping up a new mine during the unprecedented conditions related to COVID-19,” Mr McConnell said.
“There were no Lost Time Incidents during the quarter and we have achieved a very impressive 2.7 million hours LTI free. Effective health protection measures put in place have safeguarded employees and local residents and enabled mine operations to continue, with no suspected or confirmed cases of COVID-19 at site.
“Our first quarter of Commercial Production included record tonnes mined including ore and waste, tonnes stacked on the heap leach pad and gold production and sales.
“We are in the late stages of operational ramp-up and the team has done a commendable job in identifying and rectifying the few remaining bottlenecks. This will place us in a good position to continue to increase production in Q4 2020 and into 2021.”
Total tonnes mined were above forecast while ore mined was lower than forecast due to bottlenecks being resolved within the processing circuit.
This allowed the mine to utilise available resources to advance waste stripping to ease future ore release requirements.
Tonnes stacked on the heap leach pad increased during Q3 2020 however, total tonnes stacked and resultant gold production was lower than forecast. Importantly, both gold grade and metallurgical recoveries are reconciling well against the Eagle reserve model and a significant gold inventory is building on the heap leach pad.
Mr McConnell said a number of improvements related to material handling within the process circuit were completed, or are in progress, during the quarter.
He said these corrective measures are significantly improving reliability and, in turn, will improve ore stacking and gold production going forward.
Victoria Gold’s 100%-owned Dublin Gulch gold property is situated in central Yukon Territory, Canada, approximately 375 kmnorth of the capital city of Whitehorse, and approximately 85 km from the town of Mayo.
The Property is accessible by road year round, and is located within Yukon Energy’s electrical grid.
