Vancouver-based West Kirkland Mining (CVE:WKM) says it has commissioned Roscoe Postle Associates to start a preliminary economic assessment on its TUG deposit in Utah.
The scope of the report, which is expected to be wrapped up by the first quarter of next year, will include an updated pit-constrained resource, the evaluation of existing metallurgical work, engineering of mine layout and scheduling and process design.
The company said that design drawings will form the basis of construction and operating permit applications for the project. Pending the outcome of the report, permitting and additional studies, a construction decision on the TUG project could happen in the second quarter of 2013, West Kirkland added.
The TUG deposit, which will be studied with a conventional open pit and heap leach design, is near the paved highway, and exposed at surface, with its features expected to provide for a potential short construction period.
The property is under option from Fronteer Development Inc., a subsidiary of Newmont Mining Corporation. Under the agreement, West Kirkland can earn a 60 per cent interest in the property by spending a total of $4.0 million.
So far, it has spent around $3.4 million, securing a 51 per cent stake.
Separately, West Kirkland Mining announced today the appointment of professional engineer Sandy McVey as manager of projects.
McVey has over 30 years of experience in mine and construction management in Canada, the USA and Africa, and recently completed the successful design, permitting and construction of the Shafter silver mine in Texas, the company noted.
"We are extremely happy to have Sandy join our team. He has worked with all levels of our management in the past and we look forward to his work guiding the engineering of the TUG deposit forward," said VP of exploration for West Kirkland, Michael G. Allen.
"Our exploration efforts in the Long Canyon trend quickly identified and delineated shallow oxide gold resources in TUG that we are moving forward as a base of operations while continuing to explore our district scale land position."
West Kirkland's focus is regional exploration on the Long Canyon trend, which is marked by the Long Canyon deposit in the southwest and the TUG deposit 65 kilometres to the northeast. The miner, which also has mineral rights in Kirkland Lake, Ontario, has the dominant land position between these two deposits.
The TUG property, which sits in Box Elder County, Utah, hosts a shallow oxidized gold resource that was extensively drilled by previous operators.
The first NI 43-101 compliant resource estimate on the property was released by West Kirkland in May, and showed an inferred resource of 679,000 gold equivalent ounces, contained in 27.1 million tonnes grading 0.49 g/t gold and 15.8 g/t silver using a cut-off 0.1 g/t gold. *
**Michael G. Allen, Vice President of Exploration for West Kirkland and a qualified person as defined by NI 43-101, has reviewed and approved the technical information in this news release. He is the non-independent qualified person for the purpose of this news release.
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