When Heron at the A1 mine adopted a deep drilling campaign it became obvious that the A1 venture was doomed due to the prohibitive cost of building a decline down to those levels. My estimate of costs of such a decline was $20 to $30 million and the grades were not particularly spectacular.
The writing was on the wall when you watch what they were doing.
MCO should build a decline as it only needs to go down a few hundred metres and be much more efficient at getting out tonnage compared with a shaft, which is going to be a never ending problem especially for loading and unloading. I think the company is on the wrong track spending money on the main shaft.
MCO Price at posting:
27.5¢ Sentiment: None Disclosure: Not Held