Aurizon pouring gold at Casa Berardi

Aurizon Mines (ARZ T, AZK-X) has poured two gold dore bars from the gravity circuit at its Casa Berardi mine in the Abitibi region of Quebec.

The bars weighed 1,105 oz. combined, with a gold content of about 776 oz. excluding silver and impurities. They were valued at US$492,000 a small token of what’s to come when commercial production begins in early 2007. The pour was both on schedule and on budget as well.

Aurizon, based in Vancouver, will start with a production rate of 1,600 tonnes per day with a goal of increasing to 2,200 tonnes per day by the end of 2007.

Both a gravity circuit and a carbon-in-leach circuit will be used for future gold pours.

Aurizon expects Casa Berardi will produce 185,000 oz. gold in 2007 at a cash cost of about US$250 per oz. using a Canadian exchange rate of $1.13.

Casa Berardi’s mine life is set at just over 6 years, with a total production of more than 1 million oz. gold from 4.8 million tonnes of ore.

Aurizon owns 100% of Casa Berardi and has continued exploration drilling on the property in hopes of extending its life. There are 2.7 million tonnes of indicated resources with an average grade of 5.1 grams gold per tonne and 5.6 million tonnes of inferred resources averaging 6.5 grams gold per tonne.

The company is also drilling at the Joanna gold property eastand the Kipawa gold-uranium property, east and south of Rouyn-Noranda, respectively.