The Victoria Gold Corp. is facing legal charges unrelated to the June 24 landslide at Eagle Gold Mine site.
That was the word this morning from John Thompson, a spokesperson for the territorial Department of Energy, Mines and Resources.
The charges were mentioned briefly by Premier Ranj Pillai and during a June 27 technical briefing by government staff, but no details were provided.
According to Thompson, “In January, formal charges were laid, which initiated court proceedings against Victoria Gold Corp. for contraventions of licence conditions.
“These charges relate to minimum water storage requirements and adherence to operational plans. The incidents occurred from October 2022 to October 2023. There are charges under the Waters Act and under the Quartz Mining Act.”
Work was stopped at the mine about 90 kilometres northeast of Mayo when the company announced, after the landslide, the failure of its heap-leach pad. That’s part of the system that uses a cyanide solution to extract gold from ore.
Laura Seeley, a spokesperson for Yukon cabinet communications, and Thompson both said they expected to receive results of the water sampling later today.
“Once we receive the results from water sampling, we’ll hold a technical briefing to update the public and to share other relevant information,” Seeley said in an email.
“We anticipate receiving the on-site water sample results today, although they could potentially arrive later this week, with the off-site water sampling results expected later this week as well. We all recognize how important it is to get results quickly.”
The Yukon chapter of the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS) issued a media release following the June 27 briefing.
“Victoria Gold committed a huge breach of trust to Yukoners and especially to the First Nation of Nacho Nyäk Dun. It’s unacceptable that they have remained nearly silent and are relying on (the) Yukon government to give updates to the public, vague as they are, on the heap leach failure,” CPAWS said.
“Messaging from the government has focused on the company’s efforts at containing the cyanide solution, which stands in stark contrast to the statement from the engineer consulting for the First Nation of Nacho Nyäk Dun, who stated it would be impossible for everything to be contained,” the society added.
“This is not the time to treat the glass as half-full, and Yukoners deserve to know just how bad things could be.”
The company has not issued a statement since June 24, the day the landslide occurred, nor has it responded to efforts to contact it.
