The Volta Grande gold project contains two target areas named the North and South blocks; the former contains four large mineralized areas: (1) the Ouro Verde area in the northwestern part of the North Block, (2) the Grota Seca area, (3) the Junction area that connects Grota Seca and Ouro Verde and (4) the Greia area north of Grota Seca. The South Block comprises three target areas: (1) Pequi in the northern part of the South Block, (2) Grande in the southern part of the South Block, and (3) Itatá in the southeastern part of the South Block. The North Block as well as the South Block include old and new garimpeiros workings.

In the central part of the North Block, a north-northwest–trending lineament separates the southeastern mineralized zones of the Grota Seca from the northwestern zones at Ouro Verde and coincides largely with the Junction area. This lineament is parallel to other regional lineaments with similar orientation.

There is a complicated contact relationship between auriferous bedrock and the overlying saprolitic material. At Grota Seca, near recent garimpeiros workings, almost fresh diorite is in sharp contact with saprolitic material, which is at least 8 metres thick. This juxtaposition indicates that the saprolite is not made up of regular regolithic material developed on top of bedrock, but is transported by faulting parallel to the major shear zone that hosts the gold mineralization.

There are a number of north-northwest–tr ........

The open pit mine includes two separate pits - Ouro Verde and Grota Seca. They are designed to be mined with proven technology and equipment.

The saprolite overlain on the deposits requires no drilling and blasting. This saprolite has more of a sandy texture than clay. Mining of this material will be with the front end loaders initially. As the shovels are erected, they will be tasked with mining the lower portion of the saprolite near the weathered contact where underfoot conditions will be more stable.

Suspended dump bodies have been included in the specification and costing of the haulage trucks. The suspended dump bodies are designed to reduce carry back of the saprolite material and also increased life from increased abrasion resistance with their rubber beds hauling the rock, both waste and ore.

The rock beneath the saprolite will be drilled with 200 mm down the hole (DTH) drills with a 10 m bench. Benches will be prepared with the track dozers and rubber tired dozer. The drill will then drill on the pattern size as specified by engineering for either waste or ore. That determination will be made based on the results of the grade control drilling completed with the RC drills. The grade control drilling will be in ahead of the bench mining to allow up to 18 months of advance information on the contacts.

The Study mine schedule is based on the mining of 4 phases in Ouro Verde and 6 phases in Grota Seca. A quarry is opened ini ........

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