grade has improved materially from
5.3% when we took over the mine to
as high at 7% in Q4 2018,” says
Buncic. Part of this success can be
traced to Ascendant’s Lagoa Salgada
mining project in Portugal, itself
located within the famed Iberian
Pyrite Belt. “At Lagoa Salgada, we
conducted gravity and induced
polarization (IP) work which we found
to be very effective in finding addi-
tional anomalies and targets to follow
up. We brought the same group that
conducted that study over to El
Mochito, and their underground,
gravity and IP studies have opened
up the potential of the western part
of the mine.”
In February of this year, the company
completed a 700-meter tunnel from
the Esperanza ore body in the
northwest of the mine to the crusher.
The tunnel provides a more direct
route between the sites, circumvent-
ing the original winding route com-
prised of rough terrain. Not only has
this opened up a previously unex-
plored part of the mine and minimized
the wear and tear of the associated
machinery, but it is emblematic of the350
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