Vertex drives Reward underground mine on four mining fronts

• Vertex is moving to high-grade production at its Reward gold mine as stoping gets underway at the 1670 airleg stope
• Over the last five days, 125t has been mined and processed
• Multiple mining fronts being developed along more than 400m of strike to achieve continuous feed to the plant

Special report: Momentum is building at the Reward underground gold mine in the historic Hill End gold field in NSW where Vertex Minerals has multiple mining fronts running, including the newly producing 1670 Shrink Stope. 

Vertex Minerals (ASX:VTX) is still in the early stages of developing its underground mine, and while the production ramp-up was slowed by delays in high-voltage equipment delivery and commissioning, the installation of an 11,000-volt power distribution system is expected to deliver major long-term benefits.

With those foundations in place, gold production is steadily increasing, and Vertex expects to see ongoing improvements in output.

On the processing side, the company continues to refine its chemical-free approach to gold recovery, with efforts focused on boosting recoveries as operations transition from surface stockpiles to higher-grade underground ore.

Vertex ramps up Reward with four active mining fronts

Mining at the 1670 airleg stope is well underway, with the focus remaining on low tonnage but high-grade ore as 125t of product was mined and processed in the past five days.

The second mining front is the establishment of the 1438 longhole stope, where drilling kicked off earlier this month.

Blasting is expected to begin within the next two weeks, designed to deliver around 660t at an estimated 6g/t gold.

The third mining front is the 1720 cut-and-fill stope, which will use jumbo production to target the high-grade Mica and Mica 2 veins.

New ground support is being installed with stoping set to kick off in October.

The fourth mining front will be on the Amalgamated Vein with capital development designed to duplicate and parallel the existing access drive to the Reward Shaft.

This will allow the mining of stopes along the existing access drive.

The company says it’s important to focus capital development on veins outside the current resource of 419,000 tonnes at 16.72 g/t, or 225,200 ounces of gold, and in areas that haven’t been drilled yet

It expects that sections of this development will be economic to process and add to gold production.

Additional development headings will begin as mine scheduling allows.

More from VTX: Vertex blasts super high-grade Reward gold mine

Reward ore to feed gravity-only plant

Reward ore will be processed via the gravity only gold processing plant at the entry to the mine.

The underground ore will, over time, provide high-grade feed to the gravity plant.

Vertex aims to have developed multiple mining fronts, with around 400m of strike to achieve continuous feed to the plant.

This article was developed in collaboration with Vertex Minerals, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.

This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.