This was my trip to Kalgoorlie/Boulder in Western Australia in March 2018, to visit the historic town of Kalgoorlie, and the Super Pit. The drive from Perth to Kalgoorlie is approximately 6 h 30 min (593.2 km) via Great Eastern Hwy. It is not a very exciting drive, the scenery does not change much. The Goldfields Water Supply Scheme pipeline is your companion for most of the way.
QUICK HISTORY: In the winter of 1893, prospectors Patrick (Paddy) Hannan, Tom Flanagan, and Dan Shea were travelling to Mount Youle, when one of their horses cast a shoe. During the halt in their journey, the men noticed signs of gold in the area around the foot of what is now the Mount Charlotte gold mine, located on a small hill north of the current city, and decided to stay and investigate. On 17 June 1893, Hannan filed a Reward Claim, leading to hundreds of men swarming to the area in search of gold, and Kalgoorlie, originally called Hannan’s Find, was born.
The Fimiston Open Pit, colloquially known as the Super Pit, was Australia’s largest open cut gold mine until 2016 when it was surpassed by the Newmont Boddington gold mine also in Western Australia. The Super Pit is located off the Goldfields Highway on the south-east edge of Kalgoorlie, Western Australia. The pit is oblong in plan view and is approximately 3.5 kilometers long, 1.5 kilometers wide and over 600 meters deep.
The Fimiston Open Pit is owned by Kalgoorlie Consolidated Gold Mines Pty Ltd, a company owned 50:50 by Barrick Gold Corporation and Newmont Goldcorp. The mine produced 628,000 troy ounces (19.5 t) of gold in 2018, and employs around 1,100 employees and contractors directly on site.