Heliostar Metals to Restart Mining at La Colorada in January 2025

Heliostar Metals announced plans to restart mining operations at the La Colorada Mine in Sonora in January 2025, with a focus on the Junkyard Stockpile. The company considers this to be the first significant mining activity at the site since September 2023.

The planned restart involves recommencing crushing and stacking, a process that is expected to augment and eventually replace the current gold production from residual leaching at the mine. Heliostar has conducted a work program at the Junkyard Stockpile, which included drilling, resource modeling, and metallurgical testing. A total of 57 drill holes were completed, totaling 2,290m. “Recommencing mining operations at La Colorada is a key step for Heliostar to start 2025. The plan to recommence crushing and stacking will drive the company’s guidance forecast next year,” said Charles Funk, CEO, Heliostar Metals.

Funk further emphasized that the Junkyard Stockpile has been a focus of recent work, including the completion of a metallurgical assessment and the receipt of quotes from potential mining contractors. A technical report on La Colorada is expected to be published in January 2025, which will detail the results of the drilling, resource modeling, and metallurgical testing processes.

The Junkyard Stockpile, located approximately 800m southwest of the La Colorada crushing circuit, is a historic waste rock storage area. It consists of material mined from the Gran Central Pit in the mid to late 1990s. Heliostar has focused on evaluating the stockpile as part of its efforts to revitalize mining operations at the site.

In addition to the work on the Junkyard Stockpile, the company has identified a historic tailings facility beneath the stockpile. Metallurgical testing on these tailings is ongoing, with further testing expected beyond the timeline of the technical report. If the results are positive, it could represent a potential opportunity for future resource recovery. “A restart and the pending technical report for La Colorada has it strongly placed to drive Heliostar toward our goal of becoming a mid-tier gold producer,” Funk noted.