The Coleman Mine includes the original Coleman deposits, consisting of the Upper and Lower Coleman, and the High Shaft Copper deposit. No mining is currently conducted in these areas. It also includes the McCreedy East deposits, including the Main, West, 153 and 170 deposits where active mining is occurring. Other deposits include the inactive East and 7386/6166 Footwall Zone areas. Structure There are three major structural features encountered at the Coleman Mine: - Fraser #2 Fault: also known as the #2 East Fault, strikes approximately north to south and is steeply dipping (60–80°). A splay of the Fraser #2 Fault has intersected the upper Main Orebody and has caused some localized difficult mining conditions; - Lunchroom Fault: strikes roughly north to south, with a variable dip of 50–70° to the northeast along its length. Encountered on nearly every cut on the Main Orebody; locally associated with bad ground; - Bob’s Lake Fault: strikes roughly northwest, and dips to the east at approximately 70–90°; locally associated with bad ground. Mineralization Contact-style mineralization forms high-grade nickel-rich pods or sulphide concentrations, that are surrounded by a low-grade halo in the host sublayer norite or footwall/granite breccia. The sulphide mineral assemblage consists of pyrrhotite, pentlandite, chalcopyrite and minor pyrite. Variations in style and orientation of mineralization occur abruptly over small distances, resulting in a complex mode of sulphide occur ........

Slot–slash, Mechanized post-pillar cut-and-fill, Narrow vein cut-and-fill and Uppers retreat mining methods are employed for ore extraction. A mix of mill rock tailings and alluvial sands are used for backfilling. Slot–Slash Slot–slash mining is a bulk mining method that entails blasting vertical slices of ore to a free face, which initially will be a blasted inverse raise, or a bored raise. The amount of ore that can be blasted at any given time is limited to the existing void space and the available free face. Blastholes are loaded with staggered decks to break anywhere from 6 m to the entire length of the hole. The blocks are slashed out to the stope boundaries and up to a crown. The final crown is taken in one blast. This method concentrates loading and blasting operations, and, once a slot has been established, stopes of 25,000–40,000 t of ore can be completely broken in 3–5 separate blasts, while smaller stopes can be blasted in one blast. Blastholes are drilled using in-the-hole (ITH) drills. Prior to blasting, long blastholes are surveyed in order to determine their location and all holes are probed with a conductivity probe to confirm ore limits. If required, new holes are drilled to reduce burdens created by drilling inaccuracy and to blast additional ore found during the conductivity tests. Slot–slash mining maximizes the availability of broken ore and increases the efficiency of stope service operations without compromising muck (waste) fragmentation. The ........

Crushed ore is conveyed from the underground crusher to the Coleman #1 Shaft, where it is hoisted to surface by two 17.2 t (19 ton) skips operating in balance. On surface, ore is transported by 36 t (40 ton) highway trucks to a load-out at the rail head, for stockpile and rail transportation to the Clarabelle Mill. Clarabelle Mill In 2017, the crushing plant and rod mill circuit was put on care and maintenance and the Clarabelle Mill became a SAG-only operating plant. The ore feeds the semi-autogenous grind (SAG) mill where ore is ground with added water. Discharge passes through a trommel; coarse trommel oversize material is transferred back to the tipple building by conveyor, while the trommel undersize is pumped to vibrating screens located near the feed of the SAG mill. Screen oversize is fed back into the SAG mill while the screen undersize is pumped to the ball mill feed distribution pumping system; Product from primary grinding circuit feeds the ball mill feed distribution system, which can send slurry to the cyclone feed pumpboxes of six ball mills. Each ball mill in combination with its own cyclone system grinds the material to a target of 80% passing 150 µm (106 µm for sulphides). Once the material is ground to the correct size, the slurry is sent to flotation.

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