Thorunn Howatt
Northern News Services

Hay River (Dec 10/01) - New technology and a familiar face could help bring an abandoned lead-zinc mine back to life.

Terrastar is the company responsible for the Pine Point project near Hay River. It hopes to have a camp set up in just a few months for drilling and feasibility studies.

Work in the first year could add up to $1 million and the company plans to spend $5 million on the project in the next five years.

That money still has to be raised, a task that will in part be shared by one Margaret Kent, known to most Northerners as Peggy Witte.

"Margaret Kent has a great ability to finance, acquire and develop these projects," said the Kent Burns Group's Graham Eacott.

Eacott said Kent would not be personally involved in the project but would have a large role in its financing.

The Kent Burns Group submitted an application for exploratory drilling at the old mine site to the Mackenzie Valley Land and Water Board last October. That company is a partnership between geologist Ross Burns and Kent, who, through her company Royal Oak Mines, operated Yellowknife's Giant Mine for nine years.

Her term at Giant was dominated by labour disputes and a $250-million toxic legacy that was left for taxpayers to clean up when Royal Oak went bankrupt. The Kent Burns Groups says that's all history.

"If there are stories coming from the past, we are not interested," said Terrastar's Don Rippon.

"Margaret Kent has raised over $1 billion for the acquisition, financing and development of mines in Canada," said Eacott.

The technology that could bring the old mine back to life is notable as well.

"There are a lot of positive aspects to having a mine shut down for nearly 20 years," said Burns, who staked the Pine Point claim after Cominco's rights expired. Located about 100 kilometres east of Hay River, Pine Point was one of the most profitable mines in Canada in its time. It was operated by Cominco until 1987 when it was no longer economical and was shut down. It has a paved road and power lines right to the mine site. In its heyday the mine employed 650 people and supported a whole town of more than 1,500 people.

Technology, said Burns, could bring the place back to a profitable life. One of them is the use of "dense media separation." That process separate ore before shipping it to a mill -- cutting transportation and milling costs in half.

One of the other problems tackled by updated technology is Pine Point's tendency to fill up with water. When the mine was operational, pumps had to be kept running all the time to drain the mine.

Burns suggests an untried alternative: let the cavity fill up, float a barge on top "and put an umbilical cord with a continuous miner on the end of it." The Kent Burns Group acts as a consultant for Terrastar, a public company formed in the autumn of this year. Later this year, Terrastar (TSR on the Canadian Venture Exchange) plans to formally take over the property.