This is why we mine.
In January, Osisko Mining (OSK:TSX) wrapped up the longest diamond drill hole in Canadian history at its Windfall gold deposit, of some 3467 metres. It’s hunting elephants in the – deep breath – Abitibi greenstone belt, Urban Township, Eeyou Istchee James Bay, Québec.
A month later, it had updated the resource estimate based on 2941 drill holes going back to 2015 and confirmed it was onto, according to mining.com, “one of the highest-grade resource-stage gold projects in Canada”.
Then came the Covid shutdown, but operations ramped up again in May. The Windfall deposit was already impressive – 4,127,000 tonnes at 9.1 g/t Au (1,206,000 ounces) indicated and 14,532,000 tonnes at 8.40 g/t Au (3,938,000 ounces) inferred.
In mid-June, Osisko closed a C$177 million bought deal financing. It’s got at least 22 rigs in its drill program, and this week, one of them returned the kind of grades any prospector would sell a kid for. Maybe:
“Today’s spectacular result, certainly one the highest gold grades in terms of metal factor (grade x width) ever reported, continues to demonstrate the exceptional high-grade characteristics of Lynx,” CEO John Burzynski told Kitco.
90,700 g/t Au. Or, if you prefer, 90.7kg or 3200 ounces. Or $US5.8m per tonne of dirt.
It’s only over 0.3m but it’s part of an infill drilling return of 13,634 g/t Au over 2 metres.
The only hit we can think of that matches it recently is more than 9000 ounces of gold worth about $16 million from 500m below surface in Kambalda, 60km south of Kalgoorlie.
That was in 2018 and included a 95kg specimen stone containing an estimated 2440 ounces of gold and a 63kg specimen stone containing an estimated 1620 ounces of gold.
Before you get all puffed up about ‘Strayan miners, that strike was made by… Toronto-listed mine owner RNC Minerals (TSX:RNX).
Oh, Canada.