Latest news with #Murchison
ABC News
3 days ago
- Business
- ABC News
Independent MLC Ruth Forrest would be treasurer in Tasmanian Labor government
Tasmanian Labor will appoint independent upper house MP Ruth Forrest as treasurer — if the party is able to form minority government when parliament resumes. Labor has confirmed a no-confidence motion will be moved once parliament resumes on August 19. Ruth Forrest is the independent member of the Legislative Council for the seat of Murchison. As the most recent chair of the Joint Standing Committee on Public Accounts, she has led a committee tasked with investigating the bungled delivery of the Spirit of Tasmania vessels. "Ms Forrest has a tremendous understanding of the enormity of the task at hand, and the ins-and-outs of the position Tasmania's budget finds itself in," Mr Winter said. "Ms Forrest has championed the need for budget repair for many years now, and I am pleased she has accepted my invitation to take up the role should the House of Assembly crossbench decide to support a Labor government on 19 August." In June, the state's treasury department found Tasmania was headed for $13 billion of debt by 2028. Both major parties are working to earn support from the crossbench, after failing to secure a majority at the July snap election.
The Australian
6 days ago
- Business
- The Australian
Caprice results deliver strongest grades yet
Caprice intercepts gold in new zones across the Vadrian's system Results suggest gold grades increase with depth Planning underway for phase 4 drilling program to begin in September Special report: The final batch of assays from Caprice Resources' phase 3 RC campaign at Vadrian's prospect within the Island project in WA has returned high-grade gold in newly identified zones. Results of up to two ounces per tonne were returned from a broad 5km by 1km target area across the Vadrian's system. Assays for all 43 holes for 7,024m have been returned, with high-grade results extending Vadrian's strike to 350m and uncovering new mineralised zones at the Island project in the +15Moz Murchison goldfields. As well as increasing confidence in Caprice Resources (ASX:CRS) geological model, the results provide strong evidence that gold grades increase with depth. Results include 10m at 10.9g/t Au from 123m, including 1m at 63.9g/t from 126m, and 9m at 14.8g/t from 154m as well as 1m at 33.1g/t from 159m. At newly discovered lodes, results included 2m at 3.2g/t Au from 132m and 2m at 1.1g/t from 90m. The Island target corridor remains open along its 5km in length and 1km in width, with drilling to date constrained to depths of less than 170 vertical metres below surface. This leaves ample scope for additional discoveries of high-grade lodes. Caprice believes the newly identified 'Condenser' target reinforces the fertility of the corridor, with early-stage results comparable to initial shallow hits at Vadrian's. Drilling to rapidly define gold resource Caprice CEO Luke Cox said the results not only reinforced the high-grade nature of the mineralised zones, but also the potential for scale, with gold mineralisation open in all directions. 'The identification of new gold lodes across the broader project area is also exciting, with results supporting the presence of stacked lodes and a large-scale mineralised corridor that continues to grow,' he said. 'These outcomes reinforce our strategic objective to rapidly define a high-grade, project-scale gold resource at the Island gold project, ideally located between two major regional processing hubs in the heart of the Murchison Goldfields.' The Murchison is one of Australia's longest running goldfields, with infrastructure shaped by the historical mines scattered across the landscape. Caprice's Island gold asset sits at the nexus of two big players, wedged between the domains of Westgold Resources (ASX:WGX) and Ramelius Resources (ASX:RMS) who have mills they need to feed. Any player with a decent find in the district will become a takeover target for the hungry titans of the 133-year-old gold field, with new players emerging at a time of record gold prices (~$5200/oz). Caprice is already fast-tracking the planning of a Phase 4 program to build on previous drilling results as it moves towards delivering a maiden resource at Island. Watch: Open intercepts show more deep potential Phase 4 campaign 'This upcoming campaign will focus on extending known zones of high-grade gold mineralisation and further enhancing our geological understanding of the system,' Cox said. 'The combination of RC and diamond drilling is expected to provide the drill density required to support a robust resource model, while air core drilling will continue to test the broader IGP system for new discoveries. Planning is well advanced for the Phase 4 drill program, which is fully funded and currently scheduled to kick off in September. A new air core program will target prospective high-titanium basalt stratigraphy on the Western edge of the IGP. A separate Q4 CY2025 air core programme is also planned to test the concealed BIF gold trend beneath the shallow Lake Austin sedimentary cover between New Orient and Vadrian's. This article was developed in collaboration with Caprice Resources, 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.
News.com.au
31-07-2025
- Business
- News.com.au
Break it Down: Ramelius completes Spartan acquisition
Stockhead's Break it Down brings you today's leading market news in under 90 seconds. In this episode, host Tylah Tully unpacks the acquisition of Spartan Resources (ASX:SPR) by Ramelius Resources (ASX:RMS). The acquisition brings Spartan's 2.87 million ounce Dalgaranga operations in WA's Murchison region into the Ramelius fold, creating a multi-million ounce, $4.2 billion-valued company. Watch the video to learn more. While Spartan Resources is a Stockhead advertiser, it did not sponsor this content. Originally published as Break it Down: Ramelius completes Spartan acquisition
ABC News
24-07-2025
- ABC News
Big Bell Gold mine fined $945,000 over death of worker Paige Counsell
Big Bell Gold mine has been fined nearly a million dollars over the death of a worker at an underground site in WA's Murchison region, in what a magistrate has described as a failure of policy and training. Paige Counsell died after being hit by a truck during a night shift at the mine, north-west of Cue, in December 2020. Deputy Chief Magistrate, Elizabeth Woods, said there was a "failure of policy, process and training." She said there were "minimal safe areas for pedestrians and vehicle to interact" and the "key safety message" had not been grasped by drivers. The company "must constantly be on the lookout for problems", but "the training was ineffective, the consequences were serious," Magistrate Woods told the court. "The training was not specific enough," she said. The magistrate noted that the company had expressed remorse. She fined Big Bell Gold, which pleaded guilty to failing to provide a safe workplace, $945,000, and ordered it to pay costs of $20,000. Paige's mother, Samantha, and brother, Blake, were in court for the sentencing and spoke to the ABC afterwards. "Nothing's going to bring her back," Ms Counsell said. Ms Counsell said she was grateful the company had pleaded guilty, meaning a trial was not required, but said it was "galling" that the fine would likely simply go into government coffers. Ms Counsell described Big Bell's parent company, Westgold, as "fantastic" through its support for the family after the tragedy. In a statement, Westgold's managing director and chief executive Wayne Bramwell said the company had worked closely with regulators and various authorities during the investigations, and had done its own review of its Occupational Health and Safety management plan. Mr Bramwell said he had met with Ms Counsell recently and assured her that her daughter's memory would continue to be honoured. He said a stone memorial at Big Bell stood as a reminder to remain vigilant for safety. The Department of Mines brought the prosecution in 2023. Worksafe said the offence did not indicate that the breach caused the fatal incident, but it highlighted a failure in terms of safe systems. But WA Work Safe Commissioner Sally North said the case sent a strong message to workplaces, particularly those with mobile plant. "Big Bell Gold Operations failed to provide its contractor's employees involved in the fatal incident with sufficient information, instructions and training to ensure positive communication was established between pedestrians and drivers underground," she said.
News.com.au
23-07-2025
- Business
- News.com.au
The next junior to make a move in the hot Murchison gold fields has emerged
Odyssey Gold is emerging as one of the deepest value gold plays in the Murchison goldfield Technical studies kicking off on ODY's 80% owned, 407,000oz Tuckanarra gold project Drilling under way after $4m raise backed by quality institutions With over 30 million ounces of historic production and two competing multi-billion dollar fiefdoms, few gold territories in the world have become as coveted as WA's Murchison. On one end, building its empire around the towns of Meekatharra and Cue, is Westgold Resources (ASX:WGX). To the south at Mt Magnet is Ramelius Resources (ASX:RMS). Between them, the mid-tier miners are among the most closely watched in the ASX gold space. But they don't have the ore to support the continued expansion and even filling of their milling capacity, a fertile environment that has enabled small gold miners and explorers in the region to thrive. The latest to really plant its flag is Odyssey Gold (ASX:ODY). Part of the Apollo Group of companies led by former Normandy Mining executive Ian Middlemas, ODY has been a sleeper in the heart of the Murchison for years. It acquired the 80%-owned Tuckanarra gold project for a song in 2020, when gold was floating around A$2500/oz. The boom of the past two years has doubled that price to over A$5000/oz, while Tuckanarra has grown into a 407,000oz open pittable project at 2.5g/t, 311,000oz of those found on existing mining leases. It even has a processing solution set up, with material likely to be trucked and milled through 20% minority JV owner Monument Mining's mothballed 260,000tpa mill at Burnakura, where plans are being drawn up to reopen and expand the plant to 750,000tpa. "At the moment there's about 7.5Mtpa of capacity within 120km of it and there's every chance that will go to 10Mtpa with some of the mill upgrades that are being planned in the area," Odyssey Gold managing director Matthew Syme said. "Most of those are literally on the highway." Where would you rather be? Value gap Or maybe it should be where the bloody hell are ya? Odyssey Gold has a substantial resource in the bank with 5000m of drilling on the way. Its mining plans at the moment are likely to involve cutbacks of oxide-rich pits, material highly desirable to plant operators because of its smooth, free-milling nature. Close to 100,000oz was mined by Metana Minerals in the late 80s and early 1990s, and processed at its nearby Reedy gold mine, now part of the Westgold empire. Technical studies are under way, with work ongoing to extend the share of indicated ounces in the Tuckanarra resource so a JORC-compliant scoping study can eventually be delivered. At a market cap of just $22 million, there's plenty of upside not yet included in the company's valuation, especially with gold sitting at over US$3400/oz (A$5200/oz). While gold juniors have historically been valued in the order of 10% of the in situ value of their resources, today juniors like ODY are trading at closer to 1%. "Normally speaking we're not gold bulls per se because we just take the gold price that's in front of us, but it's been fascinating to watch the increasing levels of excitement in the space," Syme said. "It really hasn't yet flowed right through to the junior explorer end in any meaningful way like it did in the 1980s and other bull runs. "I think there are signs that's just starting to happen. Junior gold mining companies like us have resources in the ground trading at 1-1.5% of the value of the mineral they own. It's easily the best exposure to gold in the world and gold is a pretty important investment category in the current environment. "You can make a compelling case for the gold price and especially the junior gold equities market to keep on going a lot stronger than what it even is so far." Big backers There are certainly institutions though who can see the forest for the trees. One of them, Melbourne's Collins St Asset Management, is heavily invested in WA's junior gold space and recently upped its stake in Odyssey on market from 8.14% to 9.15%. That came despite dilution from a $4m placement which will fund the current RC drill campaign and the technical study, looking at mining high-grade open pit resources at Tuckanarra through Burnakura. "Collins Street are very active in the area and they've expressed a view about the potential in the Murchison area and the potential for consolidation given the alignment of resources and milling capacity," Syme said. "It's interesting that as well as increasing their investment in their current round, we also started to see some other smaller institutional investors come onto the register. "I think we're just at that cusp of being appealing to institutions given the potential for a significant re-rate now that we're fully funded, actively exploring and presenting as a very compelling near-term development." The value proposition can be seen in full view down the road at New Murchison Gold (ASX:NMG). Its shares have lifted 70% to a market cap of $150m after that company began mining at the Crown Prince South gold project, which will be processed via a deal with Westgold. "That's a really interesting comparison. Obviously they've got a cracking deposit up there at Crown Prince, essentially 4g/t open pittable," Syme said. "But there are some good indicators there for what we are looking at with Tuckanarra. "For example, they converted more than 50% of their resources to reserves, that's a pretty good benchmark for us with the 407,000oz resource. "The other compelling thing there is the metrics for the market rating. They're trading north of $500 per resource ounce, we're at a tenth of that." Long-term potential While there is a keen focus is on the known resources at Tuckanarra which will factor into the mining studies, the potential to find additions at targets outside the existing Bollard, Cable, Highway Zone, Kohinoor, Bottle Dump, Lucknow and Maybelle deposits remains significant. "We did an aerial EM survey of the Tuckanarra area back in March and it highlighted a lot of the conductor targets there," Syme said. " The mineralisation at Tuckanarra is generally associated with pyrrhotite – sulphide replacement mineralisation. "Pyrrhotite of course is magnetic and conductive and so we get a pretty good signature from EM surveys. " Southern Geoscience highlighted 32 geophysical anomalies that we're now starting to work our way through and drilling those as we speak. "We've got a pretty high level of confidence about the EM as a targeting mechanism." There could be the potential to find ore sources at depth below the existing open pit resources as well. "Of course you never know, particularly in that Murchison environment, a lot of these deposits go hundreds of metres and even kilometres deep," Syme said. "Westgold and Co. have been mining for years there now. "Generally speaking the deposits we have are just the weathered, surface expression of primary fresh rock ore shoorts coming up from deeper. "Historically, the miners wanted to mine the high-grade quartz veins or the weathered material. "We know on all of those deposits ... there are very strong indications that those high-grade fresh rock leads keep going at depth." Between Tuckanarra and the separate Stakewell project, ODY controls roughly 30km of fertile BIF and greenstone belt between Meekatharra and Cue.
