Segun Lawson, President and CEO of Thor Explorations (TSX.V:THX – US:THXPF), joins us for an operations update at the producing Segilola Gold Project mine in Nigeria, along with an exploration update at this Project, as well as an exploration update at the Douta development project in Senegal.
We review the Q1 production at the Segilola mine of 21,343 gold ounces produced, right in the middle of Company guidance, and is seeing throughput beyond the nameplate expectations and higher recovery rates close to 95%, improving on the Q4 numbers around 92%-93%. The average head-grade has also risen from to around 3-4 g/t, and now that the operations team accessing higher grade sections of the ore body. With all-in sustaining costs well under $1000 per ounce, there are fantastic margins, and target Q2 production guidance of 22,000 to 24,000 ounces with full year guidance unchanged at 80,000 to 100,000 ounces of gold.
At Segilola, the 10,000 drill program is well underway with the goal to expand resources and mine life as well as find nearby accretive potential open pit satellite deposits that can feed the mill, with more drilling planned after that at depth in the pit for the potential of higher grade underground mining opportunities down the production pipeline.
Next we moved over to the ongoing aggressive 30,000 meter exploration at the Douta Project in Senegal, looking to extend the Makosa ore body, successfully connecting it to the Makosa Tail, and expanding it to the north by 1 km, as well as doing further drill testing around the new mineralized discovery at the Mansa target. As the exploration program progresses the goal is to expand the resource to over 1 million ounces, beyond the recent 730,000 ounce Maiden Mineral Resource Estimate for the Makosa Deposit, which was announced November 17th, as well as to conduct and release a Pre Feasibility Study by year end.
If you have any questions for Segun regarding the ongoing work at Thor Explorations, then please email us at either fleck@kereport.com or shad@kereport.com.