Wiluna is one of the Goldfield's great mining centres, with historical production plus current resources of more than 310 tonnes (10 million troy ounces).

The deposits are hosted within the Archaean Wiluna Greenstone Belt, a 2.7 billion year-old series of basalts, felsic rocks, lamprophyres, and sediments that have undergrone greenschist facies metamorphism and brittle and ductile deformation.

Gold was discovered at Wiluna on Saint Patrick’s Day in 1896 by prospectors George Woodley, James Wotton and Jimmy Lennon.

Mining ceased about 1910 following depletion of the oxide resources, and difficulty in recovery of the refractory sulphide gold mineralisation at depth, despite trials with roasting.

[7] In the 1920s, the resource was recognised as large and low grade (by the standards of the time) and refractory at depth, requiring a different treatment method and a high production rate.

The colourful Western Australian goldfields and London personality Claude de Bernales floated the Wiluna Gold Corporation (WGC) to develop the major East and West Lodes, construct a treatment plant and other services.

In the 1930s, a large mining operation was underway utilising a new metallurgical process of sulphide flotation followed by roasting of the concentrate before conventional cyanidation and gold recovery.

In the 18 months to 31 December 2021, Wiluna Mining Corporation invested A$188 million in the redevelopment of Wiluna, with comminution and flotation facilities, knelson gravity concentrator, tailings retreatment facility, new tailings storage, camp and power upgrades, mine dewatering, 178,000 metres (584,000 ft) of drilling, 10,000 metres (33,000 ft) of underground development, and technical studies.

[5] In December 2021, a new 750-thousand-tonne-per-year (4.5-million-pound-per-day) sulphide flotation plant was commissioned that allowed for the treatment of sulphide ore from underground and the sale of gold concentrates to offtake customers in Russia and elsewhere internationally, including Polymetal International, a world leader in refractory ore processing utilising modern Pressure oxidation (POX) techniques.

The state government also built a railway line from Meekatharra for transport of supplies including fuel oil for power generation.

When the mine reopened in 1931 it attracted a substantial workforce and stimulated community growth and within four years produced gold worth £3 million.

Flotation concentrate was then dewatered in thickeners and filters, and passed into Edwards roasters and the calcine pulped with fresh water, lime and cyanide solution before grinding in a tube mill.

The cyanide residues were stored in shallow dams and allowed two years to weather before being leached and the gold solution being reintroduced into the main circuit.

Gold ore at the Moonlight deposit contained the antimony ore mineral, stibnite, which was notoriously difficult to roast and cyanide, and a pilot plant was built to investigate the smelting of Moonlight concentrates by sintering, blast furnace smelting with lead and lead concentrates, and refining to obtain the gold.

The advantage of the Biox process is its environmental friendliness, whereas disadvantages include the challenges of maintaining steady conditions for bacteria survival.

Of this, $30 million was earmarked for exploration activities while the remainder was to go towards protecting the company from the exposure to the Australian dollar gold price and the start up of its operations, which were scheduled for Wiluna for October 2008, for Gidgee in February 2009 and for Youanmi in the second half of 2009.

[27] Apex also considered the option to claim certain amounts of the costs involved in the upgrade from the previous owner, formerly Oxiana, now OZ Minerals.

[28] In its quarterly activities report for the three-month up to end of December 2008, the company declared gold production of 12.0 kilograms (385 troy ounces).

[29] In March 2009 the company announced that it had reached full production, averaging 9.0 kilograms (290 troy ounces) of gold per day for February.

[32] In a low-key announcement on 31 July 2009, Apex declared that Glenn Jardine, director of operations, had resigned from his position without stating any reasons for his departure.

[43] The company announced a trading halt on 4 August 2010, in the wake of a loss of $20 per 31 grams (1 troy ounce) of gold produced in the June quarter, despite cutting costs and boosting production at the Wiluna mine.

[49] Reasons for the slip in production were power outages, reduced availability of underground hauling and loading equipment and rain affecting the operation.

[50] After coming close to collapse in early 2010, Apex once more experienced financial difficulties in late 2011 with claims that it was unable to pay its employees.

Amid ongoing financial distress and following a series of mechanical breakdowns the mine was placed into voluntary administration and the receivers, Ferrier and Hodgson, were called in by the main creditor, RF Capital, on 25 June 2013.

[54] In February 2016, following significant investment in exploration across the portfolio of gold deposits and on feasibility studies in the period since acquisition, Blackham published a positive Definitive Feasibility Study outlining a plan to re-commission the Wiluna gold plant on base load free-milling ore from a variety of geologically distinct ore sources, being Matilda followed by Williamson and supplemented by higher grade quartz reef feed from the Golden Age underground deposit at Wiluna and the Galaxy open pit.

[55] In July 2016, Blackham recommenced open pit mining under its free-milling strategy, with ore processed through the CIP plant with first gold poured in October 2016.

[57] Ongoing success at defining broad and high-grade gold intersections led to a further 50,000m infill drilling program starting in early 2017, and a positive Prefeasibility Study that confirmed the potential to expand the mine to greater than 200,000oz pa.[58] An open pit mineral resource of 1.5Moz situated within a potential 3.5 km-long open pit was published in October 2017.

In late 2017, however, Blackham experienced delayed cash inflows as a result of pit wall instability at the Matilda mine and higher waste stripping than anticipated, necessitating a significant recapitalisation in early 2018.

[70] In the 18 months to 31 December 2021, Wiluna Mining Corporation invested $188 million in the redevelopment of Wiluna, with comminution and flotation facilities, knelson gravity concentrator, tailings retreatment facility, new tailings storage, camp and power upgrades, mine dewatering, 178,000m of drilling, 10,000m of underground development, and technical studies.

[72] In July 2022, Wiluna Mining Corporation was placed into voluntary administration owing to the combined impacts of logistical chain constraints, industry-wide cost inflation, tightening of creditor payment terms, staff unavailability and broader COVID-19 effects, and project ramp up issues.