This is Gerardo Del Rial with Resource Stock Digest. Joining me today is the president and CEO of Southern Cross Gold, Mr. Michael Hudson. Mike, how are you today, sir?
Listen, congratulations are in order. You know, I just got done writing the monthly newsletter on the publishing side for a service that I write and manage. And you know, I cover Southern Cross. It's done phenomenally well. We're up, you know, almost a thousand percent on it. And every month when I provide an update, I tell subscribers and shareholders to expect more of the same the next month, which is high-grade gold, high-grade antimony, some of the best hits that you've ever seen, and a continuation of what you've been doing essentially now for well over a year. But there was some news on November the 27th that I think went over the market's head, and that was the work plan approval for an exploration tunnel at Sunday Creek. That is a big, big deal, not just right now, but you know, for what it literally opens up exploration-wise and development-wise in the future as it relates to targeting drilling, more efficient targeting, more efficient drilling. But there was also like a very huge government endorsement that came with this. So I first off, congratulations, phenomenal work. Second off, I would love for you to explain what this tunnel and this approval means for the company here moving forward.
Thanks, Gerardo. It was a milestone. It was a milestone to get the permit. It came in rapid time. Victoria, which hasn't been known to be a mining state for many years, in many ways, you know, despite hosting Fosterville, the highest-grade gold mine on earth for more of the last 10 years. And the back of, you know, the expansion of the English Empire, even going back into the 1800s, was funded by gold from Victoria. It competed with California as the largest gold producer on Earth. It was producing something like a third of the world's gold at the time. So it's got a pedigree, but it had been forgotten and lost. And then Fosterville came and re-sparked the flame in a slightly different geology, something that was more amenable to modern-day mining. And of course, we found another one of these systems. And we've been working on it for the last three years, essentially putting a lot of drilling in. We got 10 rigs there. We're going to 22 rigs. It's going to be the biggest drill out in Australia on a pre-development project, and probably the world. I haven't done the stats and tried to work that out, but you're not going to find many more rigs on any project outside of mine in many places. So that's the backdrop. And then we have now a project that obviously has multi-million ounce 10g potential. We're running resources internally. We're drilling all this to put out a first resource by Q1 2027, which will have a substantial size to it. But we want to get underground, and the reason for going underground is to drill out the mineralization quicker. Time is our greatest enemy here. So getting more rigs on the project is possible by going underground, and then you can de-risk it on every level from a resource point of view, etc., mineability point of view by going and touching the ore, and there's many, many other benefits: progressive permitting and taking a lot of the permitting risk off the table early. So we went down and started the process of collecting all that data internally earlier this year, late last year, and then four months ago we applied for this and it was granted in four months, and that just shows how responsive and honest the Victorian government is. But just as impressive as gaining that permit, and what a great team I must say that everyone who succeeds in this business has an amazing team behind them, and we do at so many levels of expertise now, from engineers to hydrogeologists to flora, dust and sound experts, etc. We had the decision for the decline announced by the head of our state government here, the premier, at a key economic forum. So it was one of the pillars of her economic platform was critical minerals, and our permit was the one she showcased to demonstrate that they're getting on with business. The other two, by the way, were AI and data centers.
So it was anointed from the very top levels of government. The project's very exciting, and now we have so much flexibility once we get under there, of course, to do lots of different things and seek different permits in terms of bulk samples and, you know, eventually utilizing this access that's only permitted for exploration today for lots of other things.
