Mt magnet

The Mt Magnet gold mining project is located in the Murchison Goldfield, 600 kilometres north of Perth, in the Western Australian Yilgarn Craton.

Mt Magnet Gold Mine Owned by Ramelius Resources
The Mt Magnet gold project is wholly owned by Ramelius Resources after it acquired Mt Magnet Gold Pty Ltd, previously known as Mt Magnet Gold NL, from Harmony Gold (Australia) Pty Ltd, in 2010. The Mt Magnet mining project is made up of many underground and open pit operations. It also has exploration targets located on established prospecting and mining leases. The project area covers a total of 225,000 square metres.

Mining Began in the Mt Magnet Area in 1891
The gold bearing orebody at Mt Magnet was discovered in 1891 and since that time has produced more than 5.6 million ounces of gold. It also has potential to host new undiscovered orebodies. The largest producer on the Mt Magnet lease was 'The Hill' underground mine that produced more than 2.1 million ounces of gold up until the time it closed in 2007. The Hill underground mine was worked to a depth of 1,500 metres which demonstrated the depths high grade orebodies can be found in the Mt Magnet project area. The Mt Magnet Gold Project redevelopment, currently being worked, was approved by the board of Ramelius Resources in April 2011, with focus being placed on at what is collectively known as the Galaxy mining area. This area comprises the Titan, Saturn and Mars open pits.

Watpac Wins Contract to Operate the Mt Magnet Gold Mine
The Mt Magnet open pit mining operation is being operated by Watpac Limited, one of Western Australia's leading mining contractors. The mining contract awarded to Watpac is for five years. It began in 2011 and will expire in 2016. Its job is to re-establish the existing Mt Magnet mine as an open pit mining operation within the Galaxy mining tenement area. Watpac's contract is for the carrying out of all drilling, blasting, loading and hauling of the ore, as well as the relocation of the wetlands and installation of underground services. Based on currently known reserves and present production rate, the Mt Magnet mining project has a life of mine of around six years.

Mt Magnet Ore Treated at the Refurbished Checkers Mill Processing Plant
Ore mined at the Mt Magnet project is treated at the Checkers Mill. This processing plant was refurbished in 2011 and began production again in January 2012. It is located four kilometres from the Galaxy mining area and able to process 1.7 million tonnes of mineralised ore annually. It is a conventional semi-autogenous-grinding (SAG) mill. The company has set itself a target of producing 545,000 ounces of gold from the Mt Magnet mine over its expected six years of operation.

Mt Magnet First Gold Pour in 2012
Mining at the Mt Magnet gold project got underway during the second half of 2011 with the first gold pour from the mine taking place in the first quarter of 2012. At the time of the re-commencement of mining at Mt Magnet, Ramelius Resources was reported to have an ore resource in the Galaxy area of 20.3 million tonnes grading at 1.65 grams a tonne that could be expected to return around 1.75 million ounces of gold.

In order to bring the the Mt Magnet project to the production stage it was necessary to build a new camp for the mine workers as well as the refurbishment of the on-site processing plant, a tailings dam lift and other infrastructure requirements.
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