Haile gold mineralization occurs as an en echelon 5 km long by 1.5 km wide cluster of moderately to steeply-dipping ore lenses within a ENE-trending anticlinorium. Eleven named gold deposits are recognized at Haile. From west to east these include Champion, 601, Small, Mill Zone, Haile, Ledbetter, Mustang, Red Hill, Palomino, Snake and Horseshoe. Ore body geometry, depth, size, grade, mineralogy and alteration are variable between deposits. Ore zone geometry is strongly controlled by post-mineral folding and position within the Haile anticlinorium. Some of the deposits coalesce, especially in the central part of the district around the large Ledbetter deposit. Ore lenses are typically 50 to 300 m long, 20 to 100 m wide, and 5 to 30 m thick.

Gold mineralization at Haile is mostly hosted by folded laminated siltstone and greywacke of the upper Persimmon Fork Formation and is capped by less permeable volcanic rocks. Mineralization is typically within 100 meters of the sediment-volcanic contact. Mineralized zones at Ledbetter, Red Hill and Snake are partly hosted in volcanic rocks.

Gold mineralization at Haile is disseminated and occurs in silicified and pyrite-rich metasediments with local K feldspar and molybdenite. Mineral zonation is a quartz-sericite-pyrite+-K feldspar+- gold (QSP), sericite +- pyrrhotite propylitic (chlorite-calcite-epidote) haloes. QSP mineralized zones are tens of meters wide. Sericite envelopes range in thickness from tens to hundreds of meters and are controlled by protolith, structural permeability and post-mineral folding. Within the mineralized zones, quartz is dominant (60% to 80%), pyrite is moderate (1% to10%), and sericite is variable at 5% to 20%. Two silicification events are observed in the mineralized zones. Early massive silicification is finely disseminated to diffuse. Later silicification is manifested as matrix fill in tectonic and hydrothermal breccias and as stock work veinlets. Sericite alteration is commonly expressed as sericite schists due to sericite replacement of micaceous layers in metasediments, imparting a tannish white color. Bleaching and/or argillisation is weakly developed within and adjacent to sericite zones. Propylitic alteration is characterized by increased chlorite (5% to 20%) and a mottled texture with blebs of 3 to 5 mm calcite aggregates. Late calcite +- quartz veining is focused along fault zones.

High-grade zones >3 g/t Au are characterized by intense silicification, anastomosing quartz veins, hydrothermal breccias and >1% fine-grained pyrite. Pyrite grain size is typically <20 microns and occurs as stringers, lenses and banded layers, including graded beds and reworked sulfide sediment. High grade zones are focused where ENE faults coincide with anticline axes in folded metasediments adjacent to the overlying metavolcanic rocks. The Horseshoe deposit averages over 4 g/t and occurs within a tight anticline dissected by ENE-trending, NW-dipping faults.

Oxidation at Haile extends to depths of 20 to 60 meters and is deepest along faults and in folded volcanic rocks. Hematite and goethite are strongest near surface, accompanied by saprolite, and decreased at depth to weak joint stains.

Gold spatially correlates with molybdenite, silver, arsenic, antimony, molybdenum, and tellurium at Haile (Mobley et al., 2014). Arsenopyrite, chalcopyrite, galena, and sphalerite are rarely associated with gold mineralization.

Mining at Haile is undertaken by open pit, utilizing 5m benches in ore and 10m in waste, at a rate of approximately 63,000 tonnes per day. Ore and waste are hauled by a fleet of 12 - 90t CAT 777F haul trucks supplemented by 3 - 150t CAT 785D units. The primary ore loading unit is a 230t CAT 6020B excavator while the primary waste loading tool is a 190t Hitachi 1900 shovel.

The mine plan produces 2,840 ktons of gold bearing ore in production year 1 for delivery to the processing plant (6,350 tpd for 365 days/year). Total material movement of 22,300 ktonnes/year (63,000 tpd) is planned in year 1, then steadily increases to 35,000 ktonnes/year (95,900 tpd) by year 5 of the operation.

A combination of hard rock and soft rock will be encountered in the deposit during the mining process. Drilling and blasting will be required for the hard rock units at Haile. The coastal plain sands will not require blasting. Saprolite will require drilling in ore zones for ore control but will require only localized blasting near the bedrock contact.

Potentially acid generating waste rock is stored on a lined facility with lo-grade ore (0.36 g/t – 0.82 g/t). Non-acid generating waste rock is stored in multiple Overburden Storage Areas (OSA’s) positioned across the property. Higrade ore (+0.82 g/t gold) is delivered to the ROM pad where a CAT992 rubber tired loader transfers the ore to the ore bin for crushing.

The open pit mining method currently in practice is well suited to the Haile orebody because of the orebody’s shallow to moderate dip, extensive strike length and thickness.

The following items summarize the process operations required to extract gold and silver from the Haile ore. The plant was designed to process 7,000 TPD.

- Size reduction of the ore by a primary jaw crusher to reduce the ore size from run-of-mine (ROM) to minus six (6) inches.

- Stockpiling primary crushed ore in a coarse ore stockpile and then reclaiming by feeders and conveyor belt.

- Grinding ore in a SAG mill – ball mill circuit prior to processing in a flotation circuit. The SAG mill will operate in closed circuit with a vibrating discharge screen and a pebble return circuit. The ball mill will operate in closed circuit with hydrocyclones to produce the desired grinding product size of 80% passing 200 mesh (74 microns).

- Grinding will occur with flotation reagents present. A portion of the grinding circuit circulating load will be treated in a flash flotation cell with the concentrate going to a regrind circuit.

- The flotation circuit will consist of rougher flotation.

- Regrinding of combined flash and rougher flotation concentrate to a desired grinding product size of 80% passing 13 microns.

- Thickening of reground concentrate prior to cyanide leaching of the slurry in agitated leach tanks. Concentrate leach discharge will be processed in a carbon in leach circuit to dissolve gold and silver contained in the slurry and to adsorb the dissolved metals from the solution onto activated carbon.

- Thickening of flotation tailing to recycle water to the grinding circuit. Thickened tails will be combined with the leached concentrate and processed in a carbon in leach circuit to dissolve gold and silver contained in the slurry and to adsorb the dissolved metals from the solution onto activated carbon.

- Removal of the loaded carbon from the CIL circuit and further treatment by acid washing, stripping with hot caustic-cyanide solution, and thermal reactivation of stripped carbon.

- Recovery of precious metal by electrowinning.

- Mixing electrowon sludge with fluxes and melting the mixture to produce gold-silver doré bars, which are the final product of the ore processing facility.

- Thickening of the leached tail stream and recovery of the cyanide solution prior to detoxification of residual cyanide as needed in the leached tail stream using sulfur and oxygen, with copper sulfate as a catalyst prior to disposal in a tailings pond.

- Water from the tailings pond will be recycled for reuse in the process. Plant water stream types include: reclaim water, internal reclaim water, fresh water, and potable water.

- Storage, preparation, and distribution of reagents to be used in the process. Reagents which require storage and distribution include: sodium cyanide, caustic soda, flocculant, copper sulfate, ammonium bisulfite, hydrochloric acid, lime, antiscalant, UNR 811 A, sulfuric acid, Aero 404, potassium amyl xanthate (PAX), MIBC, and lead nitrate.

The layout provides sufficient room for future incremental expansion that may allow for a 30% increase in the overall process plant throughput. A secondary cone crusher and screen plant can be added near the primary crusher to reduce SAG mill feed size. A pebble crusher can be added to the SAG mill grinding circuit to facilitate increased SAG mill throughput rate. In conjunction with this addition, the SAG mill discharge grate openings would be enlarged and the ball charge level increased. The changes to the SAG mill circuit will result in increased load in the ball mill circuit. Accordingly, the ball mill speed and ball charge level can be increased to accommodate the increased load. Space in the layout has been provided so additional cyclones may be added to the primary and secondary cyclone clusters, the smaller flash flotation cell could be replaced with a larger cell, and two additional regrind mills may be installed to handle the increased throughput. In addition, there is room to the east of the plant for the addition of future processing equipment such as thickeners, grinding mills, and leach tanks as needed.

A major expansion (i.e. doubling throughput) can be achieved by mirroring the plant and adding a complete second grinding/flotation/leaching line to the East of the current design.