Surface Exploration This application intends to amend the EA to remove the exploration mine domain and associated mine feature from Table A1. Inclusion of the surface exploration domain into Table A1 represents a legacy issue that Heritage Minerals inherited from the previous EA holder. Mount Morgan Mine is a unique site in that waste material historically deposited at the site is now a resource for recovery. To inform the resource model historic exploration works were undertaken by previous EA holders involving drill of waste material. Heritage Minerals have not conducted any additional exploration works across the site and any prior disturbance associated with the surface exploration mine feature is associated with previous EA holders. The drilling process typically involves using a 50-200mm augur bit to obtain soil samples from comparatively shallow depths as the waste material was disposed above grade. As the drilling depths were shallow, construction of drill pads which would be typically for greenfield exploration activities did not appear warranted. Evidence from a previous Plan of Operations (PoO) (AARC, March 2019) indicated that 234 drill holes were rehabilitated during the previous PoO (2018) with the method being cut to ground level, capped and cemented. The PoO states that the drill holes were not formally certified and therefore still appear within financial assurance for the current PoO and subsequently carried forward to the Estimated Rehabilitation Cost (ERC) that is currently in place. An extract from the 2019 PoO is provided in Figure 7 whilst the complete report is provided in Appendix A.
Figure 7. Extract from 2019 PoO (Source AARC, 2019)
As exact coordinates of previous drill locations can not be determined, it is a reasonable assumption that historical drilling occurred within latent tailings, waste rock dumps and stockpile domains as these are key waste domains that contain resources. This is further evidenced by information from the 2017 Plan of Operations (AARC, August 2017) that references that drilling occurred at the following mine features: ∕ Mundic East and West; ∕ Red Oxide Tailings; ∕ No.2 Mill Tailings; ∕ Shepherd’s Gully Tailings Dam; ∕ Sandstone Gully; ∕ Frog Hollow Dump; ∕ Lower Linda Dump; ∕ Sandstone Gully; ∕ Mundic East and West; ∕ Rex Oxide Tailings ∕ No.2 Mill Tailings;
Project number: 25B061
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