In a “once-in-a-lifetime discovery,” miners in Western Australia have unearthed massive rocks encrusted with more than 9,000 ounces of high-grade gold and worth millions of dollars, according to reports.
Canadian mining company RNC Minerals discovered the unusual quartz rocks worth over $11 million more than 1,600 feet below the surface in a mine in the Goldfields-Esperance region near the small town of Kambalda in the past week, the BBC reported.
The largest rock found weighs about 210 pounds, contains 2,400 ounces of gold and is valued at about $3 million, officials said.
A second stone weighing roughly 139 pounds has an estimated gold content of 1,620 ounces.
All of the of high-grade coarse gold was hand-picked and immediately sent from the Beta Hunt Mine to the Perth Mint in Australia, RNC Minerals said.
“Recovering 9,250 ounces of high grade coarse gold from a single cut on the 15 level at our Beta Hunt mine, including specimens which could rank among the largest ever discovered, underlines the importance of this discovery,” RNC chief Mark Selby said in a statement.
“These discoveries highlight the high-grade gold potential of Beta Hunt,” he said, adding that the largest of the rocks would go to auction as collector items.
Senior geologist Zaf Thanos called the gold-laced rock finding “a once-in-a-lifetime discovery,” according to the Australian Broadcasting Corp.
“You might go your whole life and you’ll never see anything like it. It’s definitely a once-in-a-lifetime discovery,” Thanos said, adding, “This sort of bonanza is incredibly unique.”
According to the local news outlet, Kambalda miner Henry Dole is credited with hitting the “mother lode.”
“I’ve been an airleg miner for 16 years. Never in my life have I ever seen anything like this,” Dole said. “There was chunks of gold in the face, on the ground, truly unique I reckon.”
Dole continued: “I nearly fell over looking at it … we were picking it up for hours.”
The Beta Hunt mine has been primarily used as a source for nickel since the 1970s.
