Gold rush: ­Man finds massive 5.5 kg gold nugget in Australia

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Published time: January 17, 2013 18:08
Edited time: January 17, 2013 22:08

Searching for gold may not be such a hopeless thing to do, if you know where to look. Apparently a local prospector in Ballarat, Australia knew where to look, as he has found a gold nugget weighing 5.5 kilograms, worth up to half a million dollars.

The name of the lucky man, who discovered the precious nugget, is being kept secret, the Courier newspaper reports.

Experts at the Ballarat Mining Exchange Gold Shop, who took the gold nugget for evaluation, say it was found about 60 centimeters below the surface of the earth. Gold nuggets of such enormous size are extremely rare.

The amateur gold-hunter reportedly used a cutting edge $6000 detector that helped him make the find of his life.

According to the gold shop owner Cordell Kent, if the nugget was sold just on the basis of gold content it’s market value would be around $300,000. However its size and natural shape make it worth more than that.

"If you are silly enough to melt it down, it would be worth just under $300,000 on market value but as a nugget at this size and shape, it's worth significantly more than that," he said. "A finding like this gives people hope. It's my dream to find something like that, and I've been prospecting for more than two decades," he added.

It is expected the nugget will be sold to a collector or possibly a museum within Australia.