U.S. firm recruits in Yellowknife
Doug Ashbury
Northern News Services
Yellowknife (Jan 10/01) - A group of Yellowknife miners could find themselves turning away from gold and toward platinum and palladium.
U.S.-based Stillwater Mining will be in town later this month to interview about three dozen hard-rock miners.
There is a critical need for miners in the U.S., said John Stark, Stillwater vice-president of human resources.
He added they will interview between 25 and 40 people here.
"We're hoping, in Canada, we will be able to find 75 to 100 (underground mine workers)," Stark said.
He said the company has already recruited in many communities and plans to visit major centres across the country in the search for experienced miners.
Stillwater, which is expanding operations at one mine and anticipates a production start at a second mine in the fourth-quarter, is looking for about 150 workers.
About 1,000 people work at the Stillwater platinum-palladium mine in Montana. Corporate headquarters are in Colorado.
Steve Petersen, a regional vice-president with the Northern Territories Federation of Labour, said he knows of four miners going for the interview later this month.
Some are interested in Stillwater because they have concerns about long-term security at the Yellowknife mining operations while others are not happy with the two-week rotations at Ekati, Petersen said.
There's a lot to be said for going home at the end of each work day, he added.
Petersen said it is rare for a company to come to Yellowknife and "try and scoop miners."
High demand
"We rely on single- and double-boom jumbos and jacklegs," Stark said. Jumbos and jacklegs are types of drills used in hard-rock mining.
Stark said hourly wages for miners at Stillwater, which is a unionized mine, range from $16 to $19 an hour (all figures in U.S. dollars) plus a bonus which could "double" that pay.
Demand is high for platinum and palladium, he said.
For the first nine months of 2000, Stillwater produced 236,000 ounces of palladium and 72,000 ounces of platinum with cash costs per ton of ore milled at $151. Total cash costs per ounce came in at $308.
But for the same period, Stillwater realized $528 per ounce of production.
Prices for these precious metals have skyrocketed.
Monday the bid and asked for one ounce of palladium was $999 and $1,019 respectively. Bid and asked for an ounce of platinum was $621 and $631.
Bid is the highest price a buyer is willing to pay while asked is the lowest price acceptable to a seller.
Mid-day Monday, American Stock Exchange-listed Stillwater (SWC) was trading at $38.45, up $2.30, and about half way between its 52-week high and low of $50.81 and $24.25.
