Vancouver’s Northern Iron Corp. has started dewatering the north pit on the past producing Griffith mine south of Red Lake, Oct. 22.
The dewatering permit to pump out the first 25 metres of water was granted by the Ministry of Environment last August.
“Dewatering is an important milestone that will enable us to position diamond drills on the benches and drill out the resource,” said company president-CEO Basil Botha in a news release. “This event brings us another step closer to reaching our objectives in working towards putting the Griffith mine back into production.”
The water will be discharged into Bruce Lake, an adjoining water body that covered the Griffith property prior to the construction of dykes to permit previous ore mining by Stelco between 1968 and 1986.
"The majority of the residents and town councils of the towns of Ear Falls, Red Lake and Dryden see the dewatering program as a major step in bringing much needed jobs to northwestern Ontario,” said Botha.
The company has five iron ore properties in the Red Lake district containing over 500 million tonnes of historical resources. The two near term development projects are the Griffith pit and the Karas property.
Northern Iron has plans to eventually produce HBI, a transportable form of direct reduced iron.
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