Alcoa

A new estimate indicates that the past-producing Macassa mine has a proven and probable reserve of 726,000 tonnes grading 15.4 grams gold per tonne, or 356,300 oz. gold.

Kirkland Lake Gold (KGI-V) reports that an additional measured and indicated resource is estimated at 2.8 million tonnes grading 10.6 grams gold per tonne, and that there is an inferred resource of 407,000 tonnes grading 9.3 grams. The figures include the results of recent surface and underground drilling at the mine, and were reviewed by consulting firm Roscoe Postle Associates.

The estimates used cutoff gold grades of 8.6 grams and 12 grams per tonne (0.25 oz. and 0.35 oz. per ton), depending on the location of the mineralized zone. To be advanced to the resource category, the mineralization had to meet minimum mining widths of 1.5 metres in steeply dipping structures and 2 metres in flat structures, plus a minimum strike length of 6.3 metres.

In 1999, Macassa, just west of Kirkland Lake, Ont., was shut down by former owner Kinross Gold (k-t). In September of the following year, Kirkland Lake Gold, then called Foxpoint Resources, took over the property, along with the adjoining Lakeshore, Wright-Hargreaves, Teck-Hughes, and Kirkland Minerals properties. It started mining tailings and surface rock in May 2002 and poured its first gold two months later.

The estimate considers only mineralization on the Macassa property, though some drilling has been done on the Lakeshore, Wright-Hargreaves and Teck-Hughes, and the company has mined part of the Lakeshore crown pillar.

When the company took over the property from Kinross, the most recent resource estimate, from year-end 2000, was 3.6 million tonnes grading 11.4 grams gold per tonne, equivalent to 1.3 million oz. The resources were all in the measured and indicated categories.

Kirkland Lake Gold produced 16,343 oz. in its fiscal second quarter, the three months ended Oct. 31. Income during the period was $1.4 million (or 7 per share) on revenue of $8.1 million.