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Gahcho Kué Mine has reached another major production milestone with the addition of new diamond mining from the Hearne Pit, the second of three kimberlite pipes in the mine plan.
Prestripping of the overburden began earlier this year. Hearne is the smallest of three pipes scheduled to be mined at Gahcho Kué, but shows the highest grade at about 200 carats per 100 tonnes of kimberlite mined.
“I want to congratulate the Gahcho Kué team for achieving this latest significant milestone,” said Mine General Manager Allan Rodel. “What makes this accomplishment even more impressive is the fact that the team completed all the key preparation work safely during the extremely harsh and extended winter we experienced this year. Their commitment to put safety first for each and every task was instrumental in their successful performance and we continue to grow our safety maturity as we take on each new and exciting challenge and opportunity.”
The pit is located in the southwest corner of the mine site, approximately 380 metres from the current 5034 pit that launched production at Gahcho Kué in 2016. The Hearne pit is now being mined concurrently with the 5034 pit until 2019, when the Tuzo pit will join them to become the third pit in production. CLICK HERE to see a short video of the first blast.
Kevin Gostlin, the mine’s Technical Services Manager, started his De Beers career working at Gahcho Kué over 10 years ago when the mine was still very early in the feasibility and engineering studies.
“It’s really exciting to see the second ore source in this young mine come into production so quickly after really just finding our feet and getting the operation up to a steady state of performance,” said Gostlin. “Hearne is the smallest ore body in the mine plan but with the high grade adds a lot of value, which also gives us flexibility in our mining and processing.”
Hearne contains about 5.5 million tonnes of kimberlite ore and will be mined to a depth of 240 metres over the next four years. About 45M tonnes of rock will also be removed from the pit during mining, crushed to use around the site for building roads, berms, building pads and dykes or permanently deposited into an engineered mine rock storage facility.
In comparison, close to 10M tonnes of ore remains in the 5034 pit, which has been actively mined since 2016. Mining in 5034 will continue until 2024. The Tuzo pipe contains 16M tonnes of ore and is scheduled to be mined between 2019-2028.
An exploration drill program is currently underway to determine if there are additional economic mining resources.
De Beers Canada geologist Todd McKinley was with the team that discovered Hearne over 20 years ago and is involved with the current drill program.
“In 1997 the first drill hole into a geophysical target resulted in the discovery of the Hearne kimberlite pipe discovered by De Beers after it formed the joint venture. It was exciting for me at the time and continues to be exciting 20 years later as I am able to return to be part of an integrated team of geophysicists, geologists and now mine staff following up additional targets that could add to the success of Gahcho Kué.”
Gahcho Kué is a joint venture between De Beers (51% - the operator) and Mountain Province Diamonds (49%). The newest diamond mine in the world in the last 10 years, Gahcho Kué was officially opened in September 2016 and achieved commercial production in March 2017. During the first quarter of 2018, Gahcho Kué Mine produced a total of 1.6M carats of diamonds. In 2017, the mine produced 5.9M carats.