Classic Minerals advances Kat Gap project construction, presses on over Christmas
First gold from Kat Gap is expected before the end of March next year.
Western Australia-focused explorer Classic Minerals (ASX: CLZ) is not letting Christmas interrupt construction work on its Kat Gap gold project as it pushes ahead with plans to be producing in the first quarter of 2023.
Construction work on the Kat Gap processing facility in Western Australia is estimated to be 25% complete.
Bulldozers began arriving on the project site in October and began work, with Classic having cleared all the necessary regulatory approvals, stripping, and stockpiling of vegetation and topsoil.
That work is a precursor to the start of mining.
The deposit is a shallow one and Classic has previously said the first of three mining development stages will begin just 7m from surface.
Final testing next quarter, gold recoveries of 96%
Meanwhile, site construction on is progressing on surface earthworks with heavy machinery building and constructing the tailings storage facility, internal roads, waste rock dumps, the run of mine stockpile area, office and administration and workshop areas.
Classic said it is still estimating that final testing in the next quarter will allow first production before the end of March.
The tailings storage facility will hold up to 700,000 tonnes of tailings.
Intense cyanidation will recover up to 96% of the gold from Kat Gap.
Classic has also acquired six cyanide leaching tanks which are now being positioned and installed at the processing site.
Funded to production
Kat Gap contains a shallow unmined gold deposit located 170km south of Southern Cross, discovered in the 1990s and then the subject of a scoping study in 2003 by the former Sons of Gwalia, once the third largest gold producer in Australia until its collapse in 2004.
Classic has previously described the gold mineralisation there as “impressive with exceptional shallow high-grade gold in its drill holes”. Its current resource stands at a contained 93,000oz of gold
Earlier this month, Classic signed off on a two-part financing deal with Los Angeles-based LDA Capital totalling $20.1 million, which will allow it to complete its first phase of ramp up to production along with more exploration.
The financing package consists of $15 million in equity capital and a $5.1 million convertible note.
Classic said the deal is significant because it enables it to both ramp up to production at Kat Gap and also accelerate its reverse circulation and diamond drilling across the greater Forrestania area in order to increase its gold resource base.