Equinox should see a strong move soon. Here is an update from last week
Equinox Gold Corp. has provided an operations update on its new Greenstone gold mine in Ontario, Canada.
Greg Smith, president and chief executive officer of Equinox Gold, commented: “Since commencing operations, the Greenstone mine has demonstrated good progress with both mining and processing rates increasing substantially during Q3 and into October. The Greenstone team is focused on systematically ramping up both mining rates and plant throughput during the fourth quarter as the mine continues to progress toward design capacity. With approximately 42,500 ounces of gold produced in Q3 and 59,000 ounces produced since pouring first gold in May, we estimate 2024 production for Greenstone at 110,000 to 130,000 ounces.”
Greenstone ramp-up progress
Safety
Greenstone has achieved strong health and safety performance since the start of project construction in Q4 2021, with more than seven million hours worked with one lost-time injury.
Mining
The mine has made substantial progress in establishing the footprint of the first phase of the open pit. With continued expansion of the mining areas and the commissioning of additional haul trucks, mining rates increased substantially during the third quarter, from average daily tonnes mined of approximately 76,000 tonnes per day (tpd) in July to 87,000 tpd in August and 125,000 tpd in September, with peak movement exceeding 180,000 tpd during the month. This momentum has continued into October to date with the daily mining rate averaging 145,000 tpd, steadily approaching the Q4 target of 170,000 tpd.
The current operating mine fleet comprises 25 CAT 793 trucks haul trucks, two Epiroc D65 drills, six Epiroc Pit Viper 235 drills, four Komatsu PC5500 shovels, one Komatsu WE1850 loader and six Komatsu D375A-8 bulldozers, with an additional CAT 6030 excavator and four CAT 793 haul trucks expected to be commissioned in early 2025.
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