Critical Birds

At one time, I identified myself as a field geologist by vocation if not necessarily by aptitude. Many field geologists have a collateral hobby to augment the experience and/or relieve the mind from the constant focus on rocks. For my old boss in the Canadian bush,...

Well-Rounded Estimates

It may seem like a mundane question, but do we report tonnage, grade and metal correctly and consistently in our public disclosures of mineral resources and reserves? I’ll venture that our public disclosures of mineral resources and reserves don’t always measure up....

Trust the Science – Geo Logic

Like it or not, we got a taste of the power wielded by overuse of the word “science” in this decade.  Heretofore, some of us innocently thought that science was an abstraction, but we subsequently found out that it can be used as a club.  While we can...

All on One Page of Engineering and Mining Journal…

As I was skipping rapidly over the mining news and the now-standard genuflections to the “net-zero” energy transition in various sections of the magazine written by people who should know better, I paused on this page (below) for the irony.  I wonder if I keep reading...

The Orotron II, or How My Invention Nearly Ended My Career

With all this talk recently about artifiicial intelligence, we need to be careful with its application. A fairly long time ago I was Chief Geologist for a mining company that had recently purchased an operating gold mine on a southern continent, the geological staff...

Drill Hole Information Effect (DIE)

I’d like to introduce the patient reader and my clients to a conceptually simple tool that is useful for the assessment of resource risk.    The Drill Hole Information Effect (DIE), as I propose to call it, is the observation that the deeper...