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Two of the largest specimens containing gold were recovered in the Beta Hunt mine.
RNC Minerals
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RNC Minerals
Two of the largest specimens containing gold were recovered in the Beta Hunt mine.
RNC Minerals
The miner, Henry Dole, was shocked when he entered the Beta Hunt mine in southwestern Australia after workers set off explosives.
"Everything was covered with dust, and as I sprayed the dust, there was only gold everywhere, as much as you could see," he told ABC News, in Australia. "There were gold pieces on the face, on the floor, really unique, I think, I almost fell on watching it … we picked it up for hours."
It was just the beginning. The owner of the Canadian mine, RNC Minerals, said the discovery of a single cut in the mine includes about 9,250 ounces of high quality gold. At the current price of gold, this is worth around $ 11 million.
The amount of gold found is impressive – but the sheer size of the stones is too. One of them weighs over 200 pounds and contains about 2,440 ounces of gold. According to ABC, "it took three men to lift it to the back of a vehicle," or a utility vehicle.
Another large piece weighs nearly 140 pounds and contains about 1,620 ounces of gold.
"It's a spectacular discovery – perhaps the discovery of the century in the Australian gold fields," said Ross Financial, professor of geology at the University of Tasmania, at the Financial Times. "This is the kind of discovery you would associate with the gold rush of the 1860s and that will likely result in a boom in exploration."
Experts in the mining industry say that it is unusual to find so many big pieces of shiny material.
"People are still recording nuggets in gold deposits, but in general they are less than a few ounces," Sam Spearing, director of Curtin University's Western Australia School of Mines, told BBC. "Very, very rarely, we see results at this level.This is an extremely rare and very exciting discovery."
It is more common to find parts so small that you need a microscope to view them, said Spearing to the broadcaster.
This discovery is particularly surprising because this particular mine does not focus on the extraction of gold – its main metal is historically nickel. RNC says it is the first company to start drilling deeper into the area to search for gold.
The company adds that there is an area in the rock that, "in good conditions, allows for significant growth of gold crystals and very high grade gold deposits".
The discovery of valuable equipment has prompted RNC to enhance security, and ABC says "armed guards carried gold into a secure vault". According to ABC, the company also monitors the workers.
Gold has been transferred to the Perth Mint, according to the company. But RNC President Mark Selby told ABC that some of the larger stones would be auctioned separately. "There is a fairly select group of collectors that could please," he said.
As the Financial Times noted, Australia has been the site of other extremely outstanding gold nuggets.
One of them, known as "Welcome Stranger" in 1869, stands at some 145 pounds among the largest gold nuggets in the world. According to Victoria Museums, "it had to be broken on an anvil before it could fit on the bank's scales".
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