January 1980 marked a gold rush for investors.
The price of gold reached then-record highs that month, fuelled by inflation, military conflict in Afghanistan and the aftermath of the Iranian revolution.
In the Flin Flon region, gold mines had come and gone over the decades, often short-lived and overshadowed by bread-and-butter copper and zinc mines.
But the metal’s 1980s resurgence compelled some gold prospectors to give the region a second look. Tartan Lake, located down a dirt road 13 km outside Flin Flon, drew some of this interest.
Exploration around Tartan dated as far back as the 1920s. Renewed exploration in the 1980s showed promise, even capturing the attention of the influential Northern Miner newspaper.
Granges Exploration and two partners carried out diamond drilling at the property, discovering what was referred to as “significant gold mineralization” in 1984.
Granges’ Tartan Lake gold mine opened in May 1987 amid high hopes of longevity and profitability. Unfortunately, gold prices plummeted and Tartan’s 88 employees were laid off when the mine closed in November 1989.
All was quiet on the Tartan front until 2009, when new owner St. Eugene Mining Corp. began discussing its proposal to revive the mine by 2013.
In an usual move, St. Eugene hoped to restart Tartan around the same time it opened a whole new gold mine on a roadless
island near Denare Beach. While the Denare Beach project appeared to fizzle, exploration at Tartan
offered encouragement to St. Eugene.
Unfortunately,
St. Eugene’s optimismwasn’t enough to generate the $7 million to $9 million needed to bring Tartan back into production.
In 2012, current owner Satori Resources proposed another method of raising the requisite capital. The company announced it would assess whether the tailings (mine waste) left over from Tartan’s brief run contained enough unprocessed gold to pay for the restart.
Tailings reprocessing is an idea that has been around for a long time, but its feasibility, at least in northern Manitoba, has always been questionable based on existing technology. Unsurprisingly, Satori’s foray into the concept bore no fruit.
Next came one of the truly novel ideas in Canadian mining. In 2014, Satori reportedly began studying the idea of growing medicinal marijuana at Tartan and then using revenue from weed sales to finally reopen the mine.
This odd proposal made some sense. At the time, medicinal marijuana was seen as the next big investment opportunity, and Hudbay’s Trout Lake mine had already hosted a facility to grow pot (albeit with a private company, not Hudbay, in charge of production).
We can only say Satori was “reportedly” studying this concept because the company never confirmed media reports about its plans; it did, however, change its stock exchange symbol to BUD (wink, wink) and tout a “potential dual purpose program” at Tartan.
Now in 2017, Satori is still actively drilling and talking about reviving Tartan. A mine restart seems possible at some point, but Tartan has not exactly captured the imagination of investors in a real way as of yet.
What matters most is global demand for gold. Some analysts expect demand to rise in the next few years, citing growing economies in India and China, and even the unpredictability of political developments such as Brexit.
So many junior miners toil away at projects with little chance of success. A mine restart at Tartan would be a boon for the region and, more importantly, instill confidence in other junior miners that they too can “make it” in Flin Flon.
Keep the drills turning, Satori. And good luck.
