FOLLOWING the official reopening of the Gold Ridge Mining Limited (GRML) under the new owner Allied Gold in late March, the company was sure to keep its promises to fast-track its operations.
Over the weekend the first consignment of heavy mining machineries and equipment arrived in the country by ship.
A spokesperson for the company yesterday confirmed the arrival of the machineries and equipment.
“Yes, the mining machines and equipments have already arrived and some of them are already on the ground at the mine site,” the company spokesperson said.
Since Saturday the main Point Cruz wharf was busy off loading the equipments and machineries, which were then transported up the mine site under police escort.
Because of the huge size of the equipments traffic was also held up along the streets of Honiara.
The convey also attracted public attention along the road because of the size of the machineries.
Yesterday more equipments were off loaded when the Solomon Star visited Point Cruz.
The equipments included dump trucks, excavators, graders and other machines and equipments that will be used to dig the mineral ores and transport them to the processing plant to extract gold.
Some of the machines weighed about 50 tonnes and very huge, the company spokesperson said.
Allied Gold Chairman Mark Caruso during the reopening ceremony in March promised the Gold Ridge people and the government that he has a personal commitment to produce the first flow of gold early next year.
He said the company will be investing about US$150 million (SBD$1.2 billion) as capital investment into the operations.
He said about 500 jobs will be created once the operation comes into full force.
The chairman said the project is important for the country and the people in the area.
"And we are committed to get into the operations," he said.
“The people and the government will benefit from a $25 million in royalty and tax revenue,” he said.
Mr Caruso then called on the people and government for their support.
With the arrival of the new mining equipments and machineries training for local staff to handle and operate the heavy machineries will proceed before the actual mining work kicks off.
By MOFFAT MAMU
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