IAMGOLD is out to connect the dots between its new Côté Gold open-pit operation and its nearby Gosselin deposit in the belief that they are tying into one larger gold system just outside of Gogama.
The Toronto gold miner delivered some operating results for Côté with its third quarter 2024 fiscal year on Oct. 15 with some encouraging exploration results that its proposed district-scale mining complex could eventually become just that.
Situated halfway between Timmins and Sudbury, Côté went into commercial production at the beginning of August.
The Gosselin deposit is three kilometres northeast of Côté and could be the next mine in the queue on IAMGOLD’s 600-square-kilometre property, 25 kilometres southwest of Gogama.
Last February, Gosselin’s gold estimate came in at 4.4 million ounces of indicated gold resource at an average grade of 0.85 grams per tonne of gold, and 3 million ounces in the inferred category.
The company said in an Oct. 15 news release that they’ve mapped some gold extensions running to the south and west, and going deeper down, between Gosselin and the Côté mine. This may be an indication of a continuous gold-bearing hydrothermal breccia system between the two places, IAMGOLD said.
This determination comes from an ongoing 35,000-metre drilling program, designed specifically to look for that connection.
With more than 31,000 metres in the books so far, IAMGOLD turned out some assay results from 34 holes this week, with some encouraging highlights, of the drilling action that took place between mid-August 2023 and the beginning of this past September.
“We believe that Côté is just the start of what will be a mining district,” said IAMGOLD president-CEO Renaud Adams in a statement.
“The exploration results (released Oct. 15) from Gosselin continue to demonstrate the potential for the Côté and Gosselin zones to connect, in addition to highlighting that the overall size and scope of these zones have yet to be defined — as both Côté and Gosselin remain open at depth in all directions."
Combined with Côté, IAMGOLD said, gold mineralization spans approximately 3.2 kilometres in strike length and remains open, at depth, in all directions. Deep drilling still continues at depths of up to 1,300 metres.
On the gold production side, Côté produced 68,000 ounces during the quarter.
Côté is running at the lower end of its annual gold target — known in industry vernacular as production guidance — which was set between 220,000 and 290,000 ounces for the fiscal year. Management expects to see a “step up in performance” during the fourth quarter.
IAMGOLD endured a slew of difficulties during the construction stage at Côté with cost overruns, but the company said mining activities are steadily being improved with blasting, drilling and maintenance to boost production levels.
Aside from a few operating hiccups, the company expects the processing plant to reach 90 per cent of its capacity by the end of this year and be running full out sometime in 2025.
Since the beginning of October, the plant is handling an average of 30,000 tonnes of mined material a day, about 83 per cent of its capacity, with a record 40,900 tonnes on Oct. 14.
In the pit, two electric shovels are running along with 18 autonomous haul trucks in use and three more to be introduced by year’s end.
The Côté Gold Mine is the only Canadian asset of the Toronto gold company among its other mines in the U.S. and West Africa. It’s a joint venture operation with Sumitomo Metal Mining of Japan and when fully ramped up is expected to be one of Canada’s largest gold mines.
