About five Haines residents are among 178 working at the Kensington gold mine, according to Coeur Alaska spokesman Tony Ebersole.
Most mine employees are from the Juneau area, Ebersole said. The total workforce will top out at about 200, he said. Positions currently advertised include administrative assistant, electrician, maintenance supervisor, safety coordinator, and geologist.
Underground positions available include miner, electrician, diesel mechanic and welder.
Gary Hinkle, Ed Allen, Keith Sheppard and Ray Dennis Jr. are among residents working and living at the mine.
Hinkle, 22, was until recently the youngest worker at the mine, said his wife, Sierra. He’s worked there as a surface equipment operator more than three years and the job has provided him valuable training, Sierra said.
He got the job after contacting Coeur’s Meg Day when she was making a Haines visit. “He loves it. (The job) has allowed us to live leisurely. Gary’s able to have his toys and live how he wants to,” she said.
Allen and Sheppard moved to Haines after getting to know Hinkle at the mine. The men work two weeks then get one off. They share a home in Haines.
Resident Ray Dennis Jr. works as head of security at the mine, checking in visitors and monitoring the arrival of a ferry vessel that runs daily between the site and the Juneau road system.
Dennis was hired in 2006 and is contracted through Goldbelt Security Services, part of the Berners Bay Consortium, a coalition including Coeur and Native corporations. Dennis said he makes only half as much as miners, but that bad knees keep him from more rigorous work.
“For those who would like to do that kind of work, it’s pretty taxing on the body,” he said.
Dennis said a downside to working at the mine is time away from his home and family in Haines and keeping up with obligations as first grand vice-president of the ANB in Southeast. A plus is that the food is good. “It’s pretty hard to lose weight here.”
The mine’s mill is running around the clock, and two, 12-hour shifts are working. The mine produced 15,500 ounces of concentrate between July and October and at least a half-dozen shipments at 20 ounces per ton have been made to buyers in Europe and China, mine spokesman Ebersole said.
Exploration continues at the site, about 40 miles south of Haines on Lynn Canal. “There’s been encouraging results in drilling but we haven’t delineated that in our reporting requirements. Right now it’s the same (projected mine life of 10-12 years) as when the mine opened,” Ebersole said.
The price of gold jumped $10 per ounce Tuesday to $1,404 per ounce.
“The market’s been strong. It’s been driven in large part by investment demand. The Chinese and India markets are very strong in terms of demand,” Ebersole said. “It’s a worldwide phenomenon. People are watching the U.S. dollar and the deficit situation in the U.S. and Europe.”