October 2024: Women in Mining UK 2024 Summer Internship at Centamin, blog by Tesni Morgan
Egyptian Eastern Desert Exploration internship with Centamin Ltd, a subsidiary of AngloGold Ashanti
Throughout my degree I increasingly became interested in the mineral resource industry as a career option, and following a mapping expedition to Greenland quickly realised that taking geology out of its sleek textbook and into the realities of the field was where my passions aligned. As graduation approached, I was eager to look for opportunities in exploration geology that would confirm that I wanted to pursue this career. I applied for a Women in Mining UK internship with Centamin as an exploration geologist, wanting to get some insight to the day-to-day grunt of exploration, and exploration techniques and strategies implemented to develop a discovery model.
Centamin co-own the Sukari Gold Mine in the Egyptian Eastern desert in partnership with the Egyptian Mineral and Resource Authority (EMRA) and separately have exploration licenses on several blocks in the surrounding area. Sukari, their flagship project, began mining in 2009 and works both open pit and underground. Centamin’s Egyptian Desert eXploration (EDX) cohort focus on greenfield exploration within their license blocks, with current efforts focused on potential satellite deposits within the Nugrus block, west of Sukari mine.
After a few weeks and a brief interview, I soon found myself with a plane ticket to join the EDX team for 6 weeks in the desert, west of Marsa Alam. Work began as soon as I reached the desert camp, with my first full day on site working a 12-hour shift alongside the RC rig. It quickly became apparent that if day-to-day grunt is what I wanted, that is indeed what I would receive! Each day came with a new task, be it working with the drill rigs (the drill programme would be finishing up at the end of my internship, we were drilling reverse circulation (RC) and diamond drill (DD) ), learning the workflows for core logging, and collecting pXRF data from the new core produced. Following the core process from drilling, orientation, through to meter marking, geology logging and geotech (with the bits in-between also) was very insightful into what data needs to be collected to form and develop a deposit model and to progress a drill programme.
With a change of scenery from the core yard we had some wee ‘field trips’ out into the surrounding area for some training exercises in sampling strategies and practise some prospecting. For example, we headed out to the wadi to learn how to select and collect BLEG (bulk leachable extractable gold) samples, which once collected we took to the EDX lab to prep for lab testing, and for good measure had a tour of the analytical lab at Marsa Alam to see how our sample would be tested for gold assay. Additionally, we had some hands-on experience with QGIS and ioGAS, gaining some insight into the uses for analysing geochem data (such as the pXRF data collected earlier in core) or soil assay result (such as the BLEG data) in understanding regional trends in geochemistry and prioritising prospective areas, and in distinguishing lithologies or mineralised domains in drill data on a more local scale.
I was keen to develop my field skills throughout the internship, and was excited for the opportunity to practise my mapping skills in an area of interest for the exploration team. I spent 12 days in total mapping, with very sunny (and quite warm!) weather throughout (having spent most of my mapping days in the Scottish highlands, this made for quite the change) (I was assured that this was not ‘hot’ weather, knowing that the summer heat in the desert is unsurprisingly rather blistering. But, compared to the Scottish hail and the UK summers, it was rather warm…). Of the whole internship, I feel the mapping was where I was challenged the most; between the arid weathering, the level of alteration, and the complex structures, as well as the constant exposure to the elements and tough terrain, the area was unlike any place I’d mapped before and the rocks unlike any of the pristine samples usually used in our uni labs. I certainly had the chance to put my university skills to the test and plenty of opportunity to develop them further. Plus, my field buddies were good craic. Overall it was a tough and enjoyable experience, and I’m keen to continue building on the skills and knowledge that were developed during the exercise.
Two key highlights from this internship for me were the variety of tasks that I was exposed to, and the great team that I worked with. For 6 weeks I was constantly learning something new each day, which made for an engaging and enjoyable experience. The team were always keen, patient, and encouraging in teaching me something new and allowing me to work independently. The geos are an enthusiastic crowd who are more than happy to offer their time to teach the newcomers and share their ideas, and I felt encouraged by the senior team to develop my understanding of the exploration process and geology of the deposit. The rest of the ground team were just as welcoming, and a few local phrases and customs were happily shared with me over a gabana (or three). The drill team, contracted for the drill programme which finished up a few days after my internship ended, happily shared how the rigs worked, helping with my understanding of the RC and DD drilling processes and potential challenges on a project.
Overall I found it was a comfortable work environment where good friends were made, who contributed hugely to enjoying the long days and exposure to the elements. The physical environment itself is tough and can take some getting used to, which I would suggest potential interns to consider before applying (if you’re not a fan of heat or manoeuvring difficult terrain).
I am very grateful to have had a great experience with the Centamin team, and I would highly recommend to any prospective interns who are interested in the mining industry to apply for a WIM UK internship. I would advise you to consider what is your priority through completing an internship, and what is it you want to learn – be it an initial insight into the industry, or to test your area of interest. An internship is a great opportunity to test these, and going into it with an open mind and a willingness to try something new will help you make the most of it!
Sukari Gold Mine
While exploration was my primary focus during the internship, the company were very accommodating to sending me to Sukari mine for 3 days to visit the resource, underground and open pit teams. I was curious in seeing the work at the mine, having never seen a working mine myself. Since an operating mine is ultimately the end goal of a successful exploration project, I wanted to see how the work put into our exploration project would drive the design for a working mine, and how the role of geologists differs (or not) between the sites. Admittedly, I was also curious about how large the machinery actually is (indeed it’s quite big). I learnt a lot from the teams that gave me a mining geologist crash course; the resource team took me through the geology of the deposit and some of the core, and we had a go at creating cross sections and plan sections with the new drill data of the day. Underground took me through some of the tunnel engineering and we practiced identifying kinematic indicators in the tunnel walls, and open pit took me through RC drilling for grade control and blasting. To my surprise I found underground to be the most enjoyable (I usually prefer open skies), but when you have such textbook fresh shear indicators in front of you, geological curiosity quickly draws you in!