Australia-based mining company Strike Resources has announced that it has begun construction on the 18-kilometre haul road to connect the Paulsens East iron ore mine to the public Nanutarra road in Western Australia’s Pilbara region.
Once the Haul Road is completed, four trailer road-trains will carry direct shipping ore (DSO) from the mine along the Haul Road to Nanutarra Road before transportation to Port Hedland for export. Construction of the Haul Road is expected to take 10 to 12 weeks, during which time the company will finalize its outstanding contracts with suppliers and contractors for mining and truck haulage. Mining at Paulsens East to create the first stockpiles of lump DSO for shipment is expected to commence within four weeks.
Stage 1 Production will focus on surface detrital and low strip ratio materials of up to 400,000 mt to be shipped this year through the Utah Point Multi-User Bulk Handling Facility at Port Hedland and Stage 2 of the plan involves switching to exporting iron ore through Port of Ashburton, which will reduce the trucking distance from mine to port by approximately 365 km compared to Port Hedland, as SteelOrbis previously reported.