The Schaft Creek deposit has been described by many workers as a calc-alkaline Cu-Mo-Au porphyry deposit (Fox et al., 1995; Spilsbury, 1995; Scott et al., 2009; Morrison and Karrei, 2012). Other workers have considered it a shear-hosted, low-sulphidation Cu-Mo-Au-Ag vein deposit (Le Boutillier, 2013). Early mapping assigned the intrusive host rocks of the Schaft Creek deposit to the Early Jurassic (e.g., Logan and Drobe, 1993), but subsequent geochronology work constrained the age of the host rocks to the Late Triassic (Logan et al., 2000; Scott et al., 2009; unpublished U-Pb dating by Richard Friedman, University of British Columbia; unpublished U-Pb dating by Jim Crowley, Boise State University). Interpretation of the deposit is complicated by a lack of outcrop, complex hydrothermal alteration, post-mineral faults, and sparsity of drilling near the fringes of the hydrothermal system.

The deposit has historically been subdivided into two or three distinct mineralized zones, although the boundaries of this subdivision have changed during the history of the Project. These three mineralized zones are named the Liard, Paramount, and West Breccia Zones. Historically, the West Breccia and Liard Zones have been grouped by some workers into a larger domain called the Main Zone. Other workers have grouped the Paramount and West Breccia Zones into a single domain called the Breccia Zone.

Liard Zone
The Liard Zone comprises narrow, porphyritic quartz monzonit ........

The mine plan is based on a conventional open pit truck-and-shovel operation. The primary loading units will be the electric rope shovels with 45 m3 buckets. Hauling will be performed using 360 t haul trucks. A stockpiling strategy has been completed to allow the mine to give priority to higher-value material for processing and to ensure that the required mill feed is maintained. A variable cut-off grade was applied on a year-by-year basis, based on the available mineralized material for the period.

Waste rock from the pit will be stored in the east and west rock storage facilities (RSFs). The total capacity for rock storage is 571.1 million m3. Some of the mined-out waste rock from the pit will be used for embankment construction.

Over the 21-year life of mine (LOM), the open pit will be producing 1.03 billion tonnes (Bt) of waste rock and 1.03 Bt of mill feed with average grades of 0.26% Cu, 0.16 g/t Au, 0.017% Mo, and 1.23 g/t Ag. The overall LOM strip ratio is approximately 1.

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