Newmont has achieved another gold industry milestone with the first production delivered from the new autonomous haul truck fleet at its Boddington site – Western Australia’s largest gold-producing mine. As the first gold mining company to use Autonomous Haulage System (AHS) technology in an open pit gold mine application, Newmont expects its investment in AHS to enhance the safety and productivity of Boddington while extending the life of the operation, one of the Company’s cornerstone assets.

“Achieving first production from our autonomous fleet is an important step in the full deployment of the fleet,” said Newmont Australia’s Regional Senior Vice President, Alex Bates. “We remain on track to successfully transform our mining operation into an AHS operation by the end of the year. It is a testament to the enthusiasm and professionalism of our team that we have achieved this first milestone safely.”

Working with Caterpillar^® dealer WesTrac, Newmont will acquire 29 new Cat 793F haul trucks and will convert another seven 793F vehicles already operating on site to autonomous operation. The training of Newmont operations, maintenance and support systems personnel has already begun at the nearby WesTrac Technology Training Centre in Collie and the WesTrac Institute in South Guildford. As part of the training, Newmont operators are being provided with demonstrations of the new autonomous operations, allowing them to develop an understanding of enabling adoption of AHS technology.

Top banner image: Newmont Boddington, Australia