Exploration Radio

These days, innovation is on everyone's lips in the mining industry. We are all desperate to innovate. But if...we ourselves are the biggest barrier to innovation?

Have you ever been made redundant because of the cyclical nature of our industry? Everyone that works in mining knows that the industry is cyclical. There are booms and busts and they control everything. But have you ever wondered why? 

Steve and Ahmad talk about what lessons they learned about innovation from the CRAESTAR story. 

Last week, we found out about the beginnings of the CRAESTAR program - a floating exploration base used by CRA to explore for copper in the Pacific islands. This week, we continue the story. How successful was the program in the end? And what lessons did CRA learn from it? 

The MV CRAESTAR was a retrofitted fishing trawler with a heli-pad and analytical laboratory. It was a floating exploration base, built for speed and efficiency. It was CRA's innovative solution to the challenges of exploring in the Pacific islands. What can this program teach us about innovation on the front line...and what lessons can we learn from it? This episode explores the beginnings of the CRAESTAR program.

These days, innovation is all around us...a basic requirement in most industries. You either innovate, or you die. So what about the mining industry, often considered a laggard when it comes to technology and innovation. How will it innovate? We talk to Andrew Shook, who has held several technology and innovation roles in BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto. In his opinion, innovation can be explained by a single word...change.

Rover Boys were a crack team of petroleum geologists, exploring the world for the last large surface discoveries of petroleum. This team went anywhere and everywhere. They smoked camel dung and used whiskey as a lion repellent...they were built for adventure. But during their time, the industry transitioned offshore and there was no longer room left for the Rover Boys. In today's episode, we talk to David Kingston who led the real Rover Boys. This story provides a rare look into the future for minerals exploration. We talk a lot about the technology or science of deep exploration but what does this transition feel like. Let's ask Dave Kingston.

Is Wanderlust just a Jennifer Aniston movie? Or is it something more? Wanderlust is an insatiable thirst for travel, culture, new people...or just the new in general. It has driven many an explorer to search out places where others have not been to or where others will not go. This week we talk to Dan Olberg...an exploration geologist that epitomises the drive it takes to be an explorer.

It is 1987. As a university student, you show up for your first day of work and are told "you have to leave, you cannot stay here". Why? "Because you are a girl and girls don't work in mines". Does this seem a little far fetched? Well this is how Alex Atkins started her career in mining.

Alan Moore, a young Australian geologist, heads to a remote, inhospitable part of SW Pakistan to explore for copper. Along the way, he teams up with Saad Husain, a local Pakistani, that becomes his ever present project manager. This is their story and how their work led to the discovery of the Reko Diq deposit. But...it is not your typical discovery story. It is much more than that.

What does it take to be a successful explorer? Is it technical knowledge?...the right strategy?...having a lot of money?...or just luck? What if the most important ingredient for success...was culture. This episode is part 2 of our interview with Mark Bennett, a successful mineral explorer who has evolved his own views and his own successful culture.

What does it take to be a successful explorer? Is it technical knowledge?...the right strategy?...having a lot of money?...or just luck? What if the most important ingredient for success...was culture. This episode we look at the building of an explorer culture.. a discovery culture...with Mark Bennett, a successful mineral explorer who has evolved his own views and his own successful culture.

Welcome to Exploration Radio...a podcast focusing on the past, present and future of mineral exploration. Featuring interviews and discussions with explorers about the challenges they have faced, what we stand to learn from them and how we can better prepare for the future. Ultimately these are stories about exploration...the people, places and issues prevalent in mineral exploration.