By Oliver Brown

By Andrew Schmidt

ABC Broken Hill

Topic: Mining

Thu 6 Aug 2026 at 9:03am

A mining company in Broken Hill found a way to access valuable minerals that were hard to reach for over 40 years.

In short:

The company made a new method to drill through a hard rock layer to get to the minerals.

The minerals were found over 40 years ago, but the company could not get to them until now.

What's next?

The company thinks this could help them mine for a long time if the new drilling results are correct.

A big deposit of minerals was found under a city in 1983, but it was hard to reach.

The deposit is called the 'Centenary Zone' because it was found on the 100th anniversary of the city.

The company drilled 13 holes over a kilometer long to try to reach the minerals.

Patrick Walta is in charge of the mine.

The company found about 5 million tons of minerals, but they could not get to all of it.

There was a hard rock layer that stopped them from drilling.

A geologist said this rock layer is like a barrier that is hard to drill through.

Sandra Close is a geologist who knows about this rock layer.

She said it is very hard to drill through this layer because the rocks are crushed and pulverized.

The company tried to drill through it before, but the drill got stuck.

This mineral deposit has been untouched for over 40 years, but that may change now.

The company's geology team found a new way to drill through the hard rock layer.

They made a big hole and then smaller holes to get to the minerals.

This new method allowed them to assess the mineral deposit.

New estimates show the deposit is much bigger than thought.

The deposit is about five times thicker than they thought, and the minerals are more pure.

If the new estimates are correct, the company's future is secure.

This could mean the company can mine for a long time and provide jobs.

A geologist is impressed with the company's new method, but it is too early to say if it will work.

It will be hard and expensive to develop the mine, but it could be worth it.

The company still has a lot of work to do to make this happen.

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