Maaden’s 8 Moz gold resource uplift: project and pit design notes for engineers
Reviewed by Joe Ashwell

First reported on MINING.com
30 Second Briefing
Maaden has added nearly 8 million oz of gold resources across four Arabian Shield sites, including a 3-million-oz net increase at its flagship Mansourah Massarah mine, 1.67 million oz at Uruq 20/21 and Umm As Salam, and 3.08 million oz of initial resources at Wadi Al Jaww. Mansourah Massarah now totals 116 million tonnes at 2.8 g/t for 10.4 million oz, with extension and conversion drilling defining 4.2 million oz and mineralisation remaining open at depth for both open pit and underground options. Drilling will continue through 2026, while early work at Jabal Shayban and Jabal Al Wakil is returning copper, nickel and PGE mineralisation consistent with large-scale systems.
Technical Brief
- Extension and conversion drilling at Mansourah Massarah added 4.2 million oz before economic re‑optimisation adjustments.
- Net 3-million-oz uplift at Mansourah Massarah reflects revised cost and gold price assumptions in resource reporting.
- Mineralisation at both Mansourah and Massarah remains open at depth, preserving optionality for deeper underground development.
- Drilling across the four Arabian Shield areas is scheduled to continue until at least 2026.
- Wadi Al Jaww’s 3.08-million-oz inventory is classified as initial resources, indicating very early-stage definition drilling.
- Uruq 20/21 and Umm As Salam are currently exploration areas rather than operating mines, implying future project pipeline feed.
- Initial holes at Jabal Shayban and Jabal Al Wakil intersect copper, nickel and PGE assemblages indicative of large magmatic systems.
- Maaden is explicitly positioning the Arabian Shield as a multi-commodity district, building base metals alongside its gold portfolio.
Our Take
With Mansourah Massarah now hosting 10.4 million oz at 2.8 g/t, Maaden is moving into the scale range of Tier‑1 gold districts in our database, which typically underpins multi-decade mine planning and justifies more complex processing and infrastructure builds in the Arabian Shield.
The continued drilling through 2026 across Uruq 20/21, Umm As Salam and Wadi Al Jaww suggests Maaden is building a clustered gold camp model in Saudi Arabia, which can materially lower unit costs via shared plants, power and haulage rather than standalone operations.
Maaden’s parallel move into a rare earth refinery JV with MP Materials and the US Department of War, alongside this gold and critical minerals push in the Kingdom, signals a deliberate strategy to position Saudi Arabia as a diversified upstream–midstream hub for both precious and critical metals in the Middle East.
Prepared by collating external sources, AI-assisted tools, and Geomechanics.io’s proprietary mining database, then reviewed for technical accuracy & edited by our geotechnical team.
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