Holloway Bar Placer Mine - Picture of the Week

While there are remnants of early volcanos to the north west of Holloway Bar, there are massive mineral deposits the same distance to the south east. Western Keltic's proposed mine site at Kutcho Creek has estimated reserves of 17.6 million tons of copper and zinc, and once developed, geologists even estimate some 300+ kilograms of gold will even be recovered annually as a mining by-product. Now, access is primarily via a rudimentary road and a bush airstrip. Early supply flights into the area were made with skiplanes onto meadows covered by winter snows, while during the summer months, floatplanes serviced exploration efforts by landing in nearby lakes.

The search for minerals starts in the early spring - as soon as the days are long and warm enough to fly out to the high country. Using a ski-equipped Bellanca Scout, a reconnaissance flight carries a lone pilot deep into the mountains to search for a snow-covered meadow suitable for larger aircraft operations, hopefully close to the planned location of the summer exploration camp. Once an appropriate spot is found, the plane lands and the pilot marks out a runway with nature's equivalent of runway lights - small evergreen trees usually cut in advance to save time - nightfall approaches early in the spring! Once the strip is prepared, the plane returns to home base.

The evergreens clearly mark define the "off-airport" landing strip that will be used by the aircraft to haul the supplies close to the location of the summer fly camp that will serve as the home base for the year's exploration. While it's possible to land almost anywhere on bright, sunny days, the small trees provide the contrast needed to avoid winter whiteout conditions. Safety is essential in the back woods as help may be many hours away, and carefully planning jobs in advance is key to safe operations. Mining companies gain two advantages with this spring work: dropping non-perishable camp supplies near the camp site cuts on expensive helicopter slinging needed later, and skiplanes have a larger payload than floatplanes, decreasing the cost per pound for all supplies able to be flown in.

Once the landing area has been found and prepared for safe operations, the materials are trucked to an easy-to-access staging area - this one at Muncho Lake on the Alaska Highway. The fuel drums and supplies are dropped on the shore of the lake, and the crew prepares loads of around 1000 kg for the single-engine deHavilland Otter aircraft to haul to the future exploration camp at Driftpile Creek. The Otters carry their payloads from another makeshift airstrip on the frozen lake further into the mountains at the northern end of the 1,400 km long rocky mountain trench which runs from Montana to just south of the Yukon border. The aircraft will be here for a week or two, weather permitting, flying many tons of supplies in preparation for another mining exploration season.