by Doug Ashbury
Northern News Services

NNSL (Jan 12/98) - Lupin Mine electrician apprentice Peter Evaglok dusted off his resume Wednesday.

Evaglok is one of about 80 Northerners hit by the mothballing of Echo Bay Ltd.'s Lupin mine.

Echo Bay employs 434 people at its Lupin mine, located on Contwoyto Lake northeast of Yellowknife. Another 83 in the company's aviation division were also laid off. Twenty people will be kept on for care and maintenance.

"I'm gathering everything together. I'm in the process of updating my resume," Evaglok said. "I'm in a state of shock."

Evaglok was born in Kugluktuk. He recently bought a house there.

"The severance will help. What they offered was reasonable."

Despite the employment setback, Evaglok remains optimistic.

He has completed the hours needed for his second-year apprenticeship. Now he needs a sponsor company to pick him up so he can continue. He hopes to get on with a local construction company.

Tuesday, Echo Bay announced it would put Lupin into care and maintenance until gold prices improve. The mine was opened in 1982.

The Lupin layoffs will "come in stages over the next two and one half months," Echo Bay's manager for investor relations, Robin Lee, said Tuesday.

"It's a big loss to our community," Kugluktuk Mayor Stanley Anablak said.

Anablak said one employee flew in from Holman for his two-week shift to find no shift schedule posted at the Northern Store. He would soon find out no one would be going to work.

"There are three families living near Lupin (from Kugluktuk). I don't know what will happen to them," Anablak said.

Cambridge Bay Mayor Wilf Wilcox said between Kugluktuk and Cambridge Bay, about 35 people are affected.

Lee put the numbers at 40 in Yellowknife and 40 split between Cambridge Bay and Kugluktuk.

"It's a shocker. Lupin has been a good employer."

When news of the layoffs came Tuesday, gold traded as low as $280.45 US -- an 18-year low.

He estimated 25 to 30 per cent of Echo Bay's 500 workers live in the North, NWT Chamber of Mines managing director Mike Vaydik said.

Mothballing Lupin will ripple through the North's economy. Lupin jobs create spinoff jobs and benefits, he said.

The decision to mothball had to be made now because the company transports a year's worth of supplies to the mine during a typical first quarter, Lee said.

Lee said the ice road will still need to be built this winter to transport supplies while the mine is in care and maintenance.

Company-wide, Echo Bay slashed about 650 people to help it save up to $35 million US.

As well as mothballing Lupin, the company will scale back operations at its McCoy-Cove mine in Nevada, where about 100 jobs are affected.

In Denver, at the Echo Bay's head office, the company will cut staff to 37 people from 93.

As well, Echo Bay will slash its 1998 new-projects budget to $3 million US from $21 million and cut exploration budget to $6 million from $11 million.

The company will take a $14-million charge as a result of the changes.

Lupin and McCoy-Cove are Echo Bay's highest-cost mines. Both have operated at a loss for some time, the company said.

In the first nine months of 1997, cash operating costs were $294 US and $291 per ounce of gold respectively at Lupin and McCoy-Cove. The company's Nevada and Washington mines produced gold at $205 and $217 respectively over the same period.

Over the nine months, Lupin produced 121,278 ounces of gold.

Echo Bay expects to produce 175,000 ounces of gold this year, a drop of 25 per cent compared with 1997.

The Lupin move comes less than two weeks after Miramar Mining cut 130 jobs, laying off 120 people at its Con mine.

Royal Oak spokesman Graham Eacott said Tuesday he was not aware of any layoffs at the company's Giant mine, other than the 26 people cut in November.