Dear Clients
We hope you are all safe during these troubling times with this virus still very much upon us.
Finally, your long awaited update and I am proud to report to you on the present status on our Gold Hill Mine development. And our next big milestone of trial production is finally approaching, we are so close.
After a much too long wait, our liner for our Tailings Storage Facility (TSF) finally arrived from South Africa and as you can see from the attached pictures our TSF Phase 1 is almost fully completed. We had serious challenges both in the ground preparation from extreme rains that lasting much longer than usual as well as the parts supply problems from South Africa due to COVID lockdowns.
The TSF is very large, with its main area being 2 football fields wide and 3 football fields long, it is lined and connected to a series of settling ponds. The Phase 1 size is 100m by 100m. The TSF is where all of the treated tailings from the gold ore is stored. Eventually the TSF becomes a very large hill, shaped then reclaimed and covered with organics and planted with trees and grasses. The TSF and its drainage system is very environmentally sensitive and great care must be taken in its construction. Without our TSF and its drainage system being properly built, we cannot get final operation approvals, so great care and attention is required. And without the TSF completed, our CIP plant cannot run not even for testing.
And the best news for our CIP processing plant construction, our pumps have arrived. These pumps were custom-made to our specific specifications in South Africa and are critical to our plant for full operational capacity. So many unavoidable COVID delays with South African manufacturing plants closed then border crossing challenges but that is now behind us.
Final installation and testing of these pumps begins now and finally we will be able to begin commissioning our CIP processing plant and expect to see it in operation in September. As we start, gold will be produced at less than optimal production, but fine tuning will increase the yields to an optimal outcome which takes about 4 weeks normally. Assuming no further complications our CIP plant should be fully operational and delivering gold in October.
Our mining access road to the top of Gold Hill is well underway with much rock work to make a safe all weather ore hauling road to bring our valuable gold ore from the top of the mountain to our crushers and ball mills.
Our 4km electrical powerline is nearing completion which enables us to be more environmentally friendly by being a part of the national power grid.
Our elution and refinery building is also nearing completion along with our support and administration and soon the final cleanup will be done. The CIP Plant has received a special antirust paint finish and looks very sharp with our production plant high in the mountains. Government members have come to give their blessings and encouragement in our very Tanzanian project and we expect a big opening ceremony soon. And on a personal note, I do hope that travel restrictions ease soon so that I can witness and be a part of that opening ceremony.
And so pleased to announce that we have begun construction of our large medical clinic that will be providing primary care to the community.
Gold Hill capacities with our equipment on site has greatly increased. Once our CIP plant starts its commissioning in September, we will be increasing in stages to 800 tons per day processing, then to 1,500 then 3,000 tons per day processing targeting next year. We currently have stockpiled over 100,000 tons of ore for immediate feed to our processing plant.
After so many setbacks we can see the start of production. These developments and progress help ensure we meet our goal of rapid increases in our production and of making gold deliveries to our clients. We will make a detailed forecast of potential gold deliveries for this year and next year. The principle is that we complete all deliveries and fully honor our Forward Gold Sales commitments in the fastest time possible. But we have to keep in mind that we have to fulfill the local tax and country royalty requirements effecting the free cash flow. I continue to ask you for patience but with now with the equipment supply problems behind us we have the security that gold production is so close.
Wishing you all the best in good health,
For further information please contact me directly at: via email at; rslavik@rubycreekgold.com mail at; see above
Regards
Rob Slavik, CEO Ruby Creek Resources
