Telfair is one of Australia's most productive gold mines, located in the Great Sand Desert. The Telfair Mine, located in Western Australia, operates on the land of the Matu Aboriginal people and mines gold and silver from sedimentary rocks formed approximately 600 million years ago. The mine includes open pit mining, underground operations and waste ponds. In 2023, the mine's gold production will be 349,000 ounces.

Satellite image of the Telfair Mine open pit and pond taken by the Operational Land Imager-2 on the Land Remote Sensing Satellite 9 (Landsat9) on December 15, 2023. The Telfair Mine is located in the arid outback of Western Australia, on the land of the Matu Aboriginal people, and mines precious minerals such as gold and silver from beneath the iron oxide-rich soil of the Great Sand Desert.

In Western Australia's arid outback, miners dig through rust-colored soil to access precious minerals beneath the surface. The Telfair Mine's open pits and ponds are visible in this image captured by Landsat 9's Land Imager 2 (OLI-2).

The Telfair Mine is located on the land of the Matu Aboriginal people in the Great Sand Desert, about 400 kilometers (250 miles) southeast of Port Hedland. After millions of years of weathering and accumulation, the iron oxide in the soil turns red.

This area of ​​Western Australia is known for its rich natural resources, including oil, iron ore, copper and certain precious metals. Beneath the soil, gold and silver veins run through sedimentary rocks such as quartz sandstone and siltstone that were formed in the late Cenozoic Era, about 600 million years ago, when much of Australia was underwater.

The mine consists of an open pit where the ore is mined and an underground working area (not visible) used to manage and store mining waste. Shadows can be seen on the terraced benches within the open pit on the north side of the mine. The benches support work equipment and catch fallen debris. At the southern end of the mine, impoundments store mining by-products, or tailings. After the minerals are mined and processed on site, they are trucked to Port Hedland and then exported to various smelters, mostly in East Asia.

Next to the mine is a small community of housing, including an airport. Telfair is one of Australia's most productive gold mines. In 2023, the gold mine will produce 349,000 ounces of gold. At the current price of about $2,400 per ounce, its value is equivalent to $838 million.

NASA Earth Observatory image taken by Michala Garrison using Landsat data provided by the U.S. Geological Survey.