Dear Clients
We hope you are all safe during these troubling pandemic times.
I have to apologize for my late update. Every time that I expected to make a report, an important milestone would pass. Then another report should be made and now with our next big milestone approaching of trial production, we are almost ready. It is also not helping that I am blocked to travel to Tanzania. But I could no longer wait and am happy to report to you on the present status on our Gold Hill mine development.
Our CIP processing plant has been installed and is ready for testing and commissioning already since the end of April. The testing and commissioning could not be done as 2 large custom made pumps for the ball mills were stuck in South Africa. These custom made pumps, critical to our plant, were delayed both in the South African manufacturing plant and further delayed by all the COVID barriers to cross the country’s borders. South Africa had been fully locked down to level 5 preventing any movement of persons and materials through their borders.
Fortunately, the border restrictions have eased and one of these pumps has been supplied and transported to our mine site and installed and the second pump is expected any within 2 weeks. Final installation and testing of these pumps will take another week. Then we can begin our testing and commissioning for operational use.
Our other serious challenge has been in the preparation of our Tailings Storage Facility (TSF) as we have been facing extreme rains and lasting much longer than usual. This has been widely reported in the news of East Africa. The heavy equipment needed for this large ground-breaking work could not move and this was a serious setback. 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 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. This area requires high power pumps to filter and recirculate the water. 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. Thankfully the rains have stopped and the TSF is almost completed.
Then we will finally be able to begin commissioning our CIP processing plant and expect to see it in operation in July. As we start, gold will be produced at less than optimal production, but fine tuning will increase the yields to an optimal outcome will take normally about 4 weeks. This means that by the end of July CIP plant should be fully operational and delivering gold.
All support and administration buildings are being finalized around the CIP Plant and soon the final cleanup will be done. The CIP Plant itself will get a special antirust paint finish and will look very sharp as our production plant high in the mountains. Many government visitors are eager to come and give their blessings and encouragement in our very Tanzanian project. And that will be very helpful as our expansion to Stage 2 begins as soon as we fine tune Stage 1 production.
In following updates, many pictures of each of the stages will provided with descriptions to understand the scope of our undertaking and the many challenges we have faced and overcome. Several pictures have been attached to this report.
Gold Hill capacities with our equipment on site have greatly increased. Once our CIP plant is starting in July, we will be increasing in stages to 1,500 tons per day processing, then to 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 on its completion and start.
We finally reached this stage after so many setbacks. The recent developments and progress 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 therefore have to ask you your new patience but with now the security that gold production is so close.
Wishing you all the best in good health,
For further information please contact me directly at:
rslavik@rubycreekgold.com
Regards
Rob Slavik, CEO
Ruby Creek Resources
CIP Tanks and Control Room
Tank Mixing Pumps
Construction
Tailings Facility
