commencement of site works, with the mine fully commissioned in mid-2005. The Whim Creek ore bodies are expected to be exhausted of copper oxide ore within early 2009. An option exists for the operation to continue as a sulphide operation thereafter. Straits Resources sold the mine to Venturex Resources in 2010, after having been depleted and closed the mine in October 2009. Venturex sold 80 percent of the project to Aurora Minerals in 2020, Venturex retaining 20 percent, for A$3.15 million and an obligation to spend A$4 million on the project and to manage it. Aurora Minerals was renamed to Anax Metals in November 2020, while Venturex Resources rebranded itself as Develop Global Limited in 2022. In early 2021, Anex secured A$20 million in project funding from Anglo American. Geology The Whim Creek Copper Mine extracts two volcanogenic massive sulfide ore deposits, namely Mons Cupri (lit. copper mountain) and Whim Creek, which are located within the Cistern Formation and Rushalls Slate sedimentary members, which are part of a series of rift-related felsic, intermediate and mafic volcanic rocks known as the Whim Creek Group. The Whim Creek Group is approximately 2.9 to 2.8Ga old and lies unconformably upon an older basement of Portree Granite. The ore deposits are classified as supergene oxide copper deposits and are primarily composed of weathered copper sulphide primary ores now present as a variety of copper carbonate minerals and secondary sulphides - primarily chalcocite - hosted within slate and conglomerate. Ore genesis The ore genesis model for the Whim Creek and Mons Cupri copper oxide deposits is that of a volcanogenic massive sulfide deposit. The main ore zones are located within sedimentary units which lie above a rhyolite footwall and below an andesite hanging wall (the Comstock Andesite member). Ores were formed by sulphur-rich mineralising fluids carrying copper, zinc, lead, silver and iron exhaling onto the sea-floor surface, where sulfide minerals were deposited as sheets of massive sulphide mineralisation up to 7 m thick, made up of sphalerite, galena, chalcopyrite and pyrite. The region has subsequently been deformed eight times (see Pilbara Craton for details), with the regional structure being a 30x20km pericline formed around the underlying granite dome. Locally, a series of north-east to south-west trending folds control the geology. Both deposits are stratiform and dip south with their host geology. Mons Cupri is hosted within the Cistern Formation, which is predominantly a polymict volcanolithic