12 Days Later..

Hi everyone,

I thought I’d elaborate a little on what I’ve done so far in terms of actual “work”. Since writing the last entry, both mining engineers have been on their turnaround (their break after working for 6 weeks). I’ve instead been working with the survey department (not like questions, survey like mapping the area very accurately using various instruments) and the geologists.

Coincidently I had messaged my mate Ollie about drones as we are both photography/tech geeks. I mentioned to him how I thought drones would help the mine out in a variety of ways. Ollie and I had spent much of this past year pining after a drone, both agreed on buying one the moment we had any disposable income (not soon). Two days later, I had just got back from the pit and I walked into the office to see a man showing Eric, the General Manager and Ken, the CEO a DJI Mavic Pro. I legitimately stopped for 10 seconds - Eric had seen my face. The Mavic Pro is the drone Ollie and I have probably collectively watched 4 hours of Youtube videos one. Eric introduced me to Nick, a consultant who had recently started showing mines how drones could help their operation.

Eric had obviously seen my mini meltdown and unequivocally demanded that I spend the next 3 days with Nick, Eric and the drones (Nick also brought the $8k DJI Inspire 1). I wasn’t about to complain. So, from Thursday to Saturday I trotted round the mine with the General Manager, the CEO of Troy Resources and the two drones. I had to really restrain my excitement as otherwise I’d have come across like a child (I am a child just pretend I’m not 76.9% of the time). BUT THE DRONES WERE/ARE SO COOL.

Nick showed us two main ways of utilising the drones; taking photos and videos. Bear with me. Taking videos is as simple as it sounds. Fly the drone above the pit and document what is happening in glorious 4k. We filmed a blast from 400m in the air to analyse the effectiveness of the drillhole pattern for example (I'd show you this footage but I don't think I'm allowed to).

The second medium, taking pictures, is the cool part. From your phone, you can draw an area over the mine that you’d like to document. The software then draws a path for the drone to follow and cover this area. Autonomously, the drone follows this path, taking off and landing by itself. During this time, it takes photos continuously which overlap 50-60%. For example, to cover a small pit here resulted in an 8-minute flight and ≈200 photos. Following this, the photos are loaded into specialised software and processed. This is left overnight on a powerful PC. I personally took a handful of the photos and stitched them together in Photoshop to make some cool overhead panoramas that are 6000x7000 pixels and 60mb files. 

The results are 3D interactive maps that can be loaded into other pieces of mapping software. It is hard to underline how amazing processed data is unless you have spent 2 weeks surveying a 2km² area to ±10mm (guess who has). The drone, in 8 minutes, surveyed an area that could take a month to survey by hand. Furthermore, it presents its data digitally straightaway. One thing that really impressed the older mine managers here is how, using the drone data, we can estimate volumes. In one of the pits there is a large slip in the wall. You can see it in this video. From just 10 photos we could estimate the volume of the sand and therefore the mass of material that needs to be moved (17,000 tonnes by my calculation). 

I realise it is hard to convey quite how incredible the drones are but trust me they are going to save time, money and energy. I guess that’s what automation is going to do to most fields in the next few decades. Quite simply they also serve as a quick and easy but detailed documentary tool. Every day before shift, someone could quickly set the drones off to take pictures of the pits which could be projected onto a whiteboard and annotated each morning.

Following the drone excursion, I’ve been working with the geologists. I have been taking drill samples and mapping the ground. This is so the engineers know where to drill certain holes to blow up and extract gold. As well as just suggest where there is gold, from samples we can tell what grade the ore block will have.

Here is a screenshot of a digital map containing drillhole sample data. From this oreblock outlines could be drawn so we know where to mine. This is a brief explanation and looks quite simple but to collect this data takes time. Furthermore, further processing can take even longer and is subjective depending on what a geologist thinks is worth mining or not.  

It is peak rainy season right now and it really rains here (it is called the rainforest for a reason Rohin). Most operations become slower around the mine. June is a tense month. As I mentioned previously, the mine isn’t in a good place. I’ve been told by basically everyone that ‘this is how NOT to run a mine’ and actually that I’m going to learn lots more due to all its failures. From my first-hand experience, the thing that is letting the mine down significantly right now is communication (as always). There aren’t enough walkie talkies, the mine manager isn’t listening to his workers under him and there is a general attitude among lots of the workforce is that the mine is doomed. I shan’t say anymore but for me, it is great. I’ve learnt so much and I’m yet to have any significant responsibility so I’m just drinking as much of the operation in as possible (and just drinking). 

I've added some more photos and videos to this album so feel free to have a peek when you have a spare minute. There are couple showing the extent of the rain. From today I will be working with a mining engineer and I'll also spend some time mineral processing (actual alchemy) so I'll be back at least once more. 

Rohin x