Red River awards PYBAR contract extension for West 45 mine

The contract was due to expire in January 2019, but has now been extended past that date by a maximum of two years or cessation of the mine’s operations.

Through PYBAR’s mining services, Red River will launch a 4500m underground diamond drilling program to further increase West 45’s plant throughput and mine life. It is one of Red River’s three deposits at the Thalanga project in Northern Queensland.

Partly driven by exploration success at West 45, Thalanga mineral resource has grown by 51 per cent since acquisition in 2014.

The project commenced its copper, lead and zinc concentrate production in September 2017.

The West 45 deposit consists of five semi-massive to massive sulphide lenses rich in zinc and lead. It has an ore reserve of 567,000t grading 11.6 per cent zinc equivalent.

The news follows last week’s announcement that Red River also awarded PYBAR a mining contract to operate at Red River’s Far West deposit for an initial term of seven years.

As of June this year, Red River has a cash balance of $20.2 million, up from $17.5 million in March, and no debt.