Cue Gold Operations (CGO) include the historic mining centres of Big Bell, Cuddingwarra, Day Dawn, Tuckabianna, and Comet.
After four years of dewatering, mine rehabilitation, refurbishment and ramp up, the Big Bell mine achieved commercial production in April 2022.
Several open pits were mined around Cue in FY22. With large stockpiles accumulated, the open pit program ceased at the end of the financial year.
In FY23, the Tuckabianna plant received underground ore from the large Big Bell underground and the smaller Comet underground mine in addition to stockpiled ore from the previously mined Cuddingwarra open pits.
During FY23, Big Bell remained the primary source of ore to the Tuckabianna mill, with the Comet underground mine providing additional feed early in the year, prior to entering care and maintenance. In addition to fresh underground feed, Westgold has access to significant ore stockpiles which it continued to utilise as supplementary ore feed at its Cue and Meekatharra processing hubs.
Following the completion of ramp up and commencement of steady state production, Big Bell has consistently delivered design levels, producing 1.1Mt of ore at 2.6g/t for 95koz contained ounces of gold in FY23.
Underground Methodology
* In large disseminated orebodies sub level caving, sub level open stoping or single level bench stoping production methodologies are used.
* In narrow vein laminated quartz h ........