After eight months of recommissioning the Martha mine, located in Argentina’s Santa Cruz Province of Argentina, the property is now accelerating Hunt Mining’s transition from an exploration company to a full-fledged mining company. This week they announced their second shipment of silver-gold concentrate.
While Hunt Mining may be Argentina’s newest silver and gold producer, the company’s operating experience in the region dates back more than a decade, to 2006. For more than 10 years, Hunt Mining has been an active explorer and developer of gold and silver in Santa Cruz. Hunt Mining has invested more than $55 million in developing the province’s second-largest mining package — with 670 square miles, or 173,775 hectares, in mining concessions.
Hunt Mining’s wholly owned Argentine subsidiary, Cerro Cazador S.A., has been involved in continuous exploration activities since its 2005 inception, with 62,000 meters of HQ core drilling and more than 20,000 surface soil, sediment, channel, chip and trench samples.
“Between Hunt Mining and CCSA, we have numerous key personnel with more than 20 years of experience in Santa Cruz,” said Tim Hunt, president, CEO and founder of Hunt Mining. “Hunt staff have been directly responsible for the discovery of five precious metal deposits, and our people are experienced in grassroots discoveries, project development and mine production.”
Hunt Mining purchased the Martha mine from Coeur in May 2016.
Hunt entered into an offtake agreement with Ocean Partners USA Inc. during December for the delivery for the Martha mine’s gold-silver concentrate. Under the terms of this agreement, Hunt will deliver concentrate with a gold range of 30 to 70 grams per metric ton (g/mt) dry and a silver range of 30,000 to 100,000 g/mt dry to Ocean Partners’ smelter customers overseas. Concentrate will be shipped in 1-mt bags in standard or heavy-duty 20 foot containers for ocean freight transport. The first two shipment’s consisted of 20 bags with a total weight of more than 17 mt. The ore shipment averaged 47.9 g/mt of gold and 55,687 g/mt of silver, which could be estimated at 27.1 oz of gold and 31,514 oz of silver per shipment.
