The trip to Isabel starts @ 5am as we head to the wharf to get on the boat to travel to Isabel this time, The same route and course taken by Axiom staff,
The ride is approx. 120-140km on the water from Honiara to Isabel and is an interesting ride, seas were about 1m and the trip takes about 2.5hrs in a 28fter with 250hp on the back to my surprise Ryan tells me that is the quickest he has ever gotten to Isabel on the water, Today we are not axioms boat as it was not operating at the time, Axioms boat has twin 50hp on the back and is smaller and the journey takes anywhere between 5-10hrs each way….crazy. The large currents come through the islands and can cause a small boat some issues and the wind can make things interesting. A smaller boat with less horsepower can get into trouble out here
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The ride is approx. 120-140km on the water from Honiara to Isabel and is an interesting ride, seas were about 1m and the trip takes about 2.5hrs in a 28fter with 250hp on the back to my surprise Ryan tells me that is the quickest he has ever gotten to Isabel on the water, Today we are not axioms boat as it was not operating at the time, Axioms boat has twin 50hp on the back and is smaller and the journey takes anywhere between 5-10hrs each way….crazy. The large currents come through the islands and can cause a small boat some issues and the wind can make things interesting. A smaller boat with less horsepower can get into trouble out here
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We arrive on Isabel with a boat also full of supplies for the camp, not much has changed since we last were there, though the numbers have increased approx. 100 employees working on Isabel at any given time, but are currently downsizing as drilling slows down also. We arrive at the camp and notice not much has changed,
Note the Above footage is from April this year when i was there earlier, from the picutre below you can see not much has changed.
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We are greeted by Carlos and Henny (chief Geo and mine development manager), Carlos we met in April and was good to catch up with as Henny is new and has some solid runs on the board. We were shown a presentation and updated on the status with some of the images in Tues Ann also I was impressed as the what the measured resource that was drilled 25 x 25 was such a small area of our tenement and the actual jorc was such a small parcel of the asset. Carlos goes on to show where they have drilled 50x50, 100x100 and 200x200m grids and all is showing positive results all exceeding historical data to date, I asked both Carlos and Ryan how quick could they infill all current drill sites to a 25x25 grid and they said approx. 9 months, this would easily increase the net worth of the asset many times current estimates and value.….and that’s only the beginning. Moving forward Axiom would not need to upgrade its Jorc and/or prove a measure resource, though can easily be done with the drilling indicated. I ask regarding mine development and Environmental status and Ryan informs me that Axiom have 3 x Environmental consultants 1 from SI and 2 from Aus. and that all environmental work is well advanced.
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Below is footage from April again, this give a very nice indication to both the gradient of the land and the clear ridges with mineralisation up to the surface clear....amazingly you can hear RM over the chopper further ill stress the importance of the harbour and ease of logisitics for mining operations. NOTE: @ 3:45 you will see our loading area from the sky and this just ads another dimension to the understanding of the operation.
In the below clip you see clearly see the Oxidisation of nickel on the surface and as you can see it is everywhere,even a hole drilled back in April, note at the end of the clip you can see where a Inco excavator has taken a bucket out of the ground with the marks clearly visable., note also the lush greens around
Our loading location,
As seen from the Aerial footage it is quite neat and protected, easy winding roads and we can have a massive pile of ore stockpiled there awaiting a ship, even more protected in a harbour within a harbour.
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(Above we have the clearing set up for the first shipment this has great ease to access the trucks and the boats)
Also included below is video footage of the area ready to ship the ore.
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We leave the mess hall and go for a drive over the ridges (kolosori,suma and havihua) and also and importantly the loading area for our first shipment, these roads are all new and the shipping area was not prepared when we last visited The roads were good and stable and gave a different element to the visit and more ground was easily covered and different ridges explored, even though it had rained prior we had no issues with the 4wd getting about and travelling through the asset we see the vast areas of mineralisation everywhere some areas where there are cliffs you can see clearly the changing profiles of ore from overburden-limonite-saprolite-bedrock. We proceed to the loading area that we will use, the area is nice and flat and large enough to handle a decent stockpile of ore, the beauty is the protection the bay has from the elements, a 50,000T ship would be well protected and could be loaded in extreme conditions already as there is ample protection yet, the loading area is within another bay and even more protected making the operation easier
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I took a few pics and have added from the higher ridges to show the ease of operation, On the operation itself it is not complex or expensive, strip the top layer of soil and keep it for rehabilitation, mine the nickel and load onto trucks, transfer to barge, barge to ship and ship to customer. We see in the pictures that the 25,000tonne logging ship is small in the bay and makes for an easy operation.
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Driving through the ridges you come through some naturally beautiful scenery but to me nothing was more appealing than below, in the below pics you can clearly see the layers of mineralisation from overburden-limonite-saprolite and bedrock,
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Footage below is from April again when we were there previously, a summary into the drilling and you can hear the drill operating in the background.
We conclude our trip and i thank Axiom staff for their time and efforts i leave with a sence of security knowing work is ongoing but obviously frustrated at the impact the COA has on us as sh's and the company in general, It has come to a point where we are all sick of waiting... but the guys on site are extremely confident of the outcome and are ready to accelerate all matters on the back of a positive decision. We leave for Honiara again and on our way back we are greet by Dr Phillip Tagini who was special secetary to the PM and was instrumental in implementation of mining laws in SI who also now works for Axiom, He is very knowledgable and well spoken and is extremely positive with both the status and progress of axiom, i ask him a small question to gauge his current influence in the local government and i am impressed by his answers, a very impressive addition to the team indeed, on the team once again i must mention Mrs Mount, its hard to communicate the importance of what she does for axiom, to put it short...she is working as hard if not hard than RM to get this over the line and has been there from day 1...
I leave back for Brisbane impressed and relieved at current operational status but also again like we are all feeling...... the dread of knowing EVERYTHING rides on the back of the COA decision, yes we are all confident and we believe we are on a winner.... but to have the axioms fate in the judges hands and not ours is frustrating, we have done amazing to survive and get where we are, along the way growing as a company and as a team and finally after 5 long years with every emotion under the sun on this roller coaster we have the finish line in sight....
im looking forward to putting this behind us and discussing what to do with our profits if/when we win.
i have some nickel research reports from Macquarie, UBS and credit suisse.... 2 many pages 2 scan but ill upload a few pages in the next few days.
GLTA.
I4I