Site Visit: Kaminak on track to build next Yukon gold mine

Simple mining plan helps Coffee project endure tough times

http://www.northernminer.com/news/site-visit-kaminak-on-track-to-build-the-next-yukon-gold-mine/1003729999/

DAWSON CITY, YUKON — If there was a betting pool on which junior mining companies will bring Canadian assets into production over the next five years, Kaminak Gold (TSXV: KAM; US-OTC: KMKGF) would be one of the favourites. Despite potential jurisdictional challenges, and an uncooperative gold price, the company has no trouble raising capital, and is looking to pour first gold at its Coffee gold project in the Yukon by 2019.

During the scenic flight out to Kaminak’s base of operations — 130 km south of Dawson City, along the Yukon River — it’s pleasant to encounter a phenomenon that’s becoming all too rare in the mining industry: optimism. The company recently wrapped up fieldwork on a feasibility study it expects to complete in early 2016, and landed a $22.5-million private placement that includes investments by mining luminaries Ross Beaty and Lukas Lundin.

Rolling into Kaminak’s year-round camp on well-maintained gravel roads, it’s easy to assume that the site hosts a fishing lodge. The company picked up an old outfitter’s camp on the banks of the Yukon River, and the rough-cut wood cabins lend an anachronistic charm that harkens back to historic days in the Klondike.

Kaminak will celebrate its 10-year anniversary in late November, and it’s taken the company under seven years to advance Coffee from a grassroots exploration play into an asset that could be shovel ready by early 2017. As part of the FS at Coffee, Kaminak undertook a 70,000-metre infill drill campaign in 2014 on four main deposits: Supremo, Latte, Double Double and Kona.

In late September the company tabled an updated resource estimate on the project that boosted global indicated grades by 8%, and inferred ounces by 12%. Coffee now hosts 52 million indicated tonnes grading 1.68 grams gold per tonne for 2.8 million contained oz. gold. Inferred resources total 14.3 million tonnes at 1.56 grams gold for 719,000 oz. gold.

“We’re looking at a new deposit style for the Yukon. Many of the regional deposits within the Tintina Trench have some form of association with porphyry-style mineralization, but Coffee is unique,” president and CEO Eira Thomas said during a presentation at Kaminak’s base of operations.

“We’re part of a high-grade, structurally hosted hydrothermal system, and the deposit is situated in an area that’s never been glaciated. That’s a real advantage, since our deposits are highly weathered or oxidized, and we’ve demonstrated they have a strong amenability to heap leaching,” she added.

The oxide opportunities at Coffee formed the foundation for a preliminary economic assessment (PEA) Kaminak released last year. The mine plan models a US$305-million open-pit mine, with an 11-year life that would crank out 167,000 oz. gold per year at all-in sustaining costs of US$688 per oz. Assuming a US$1,100 per oz. gold price, Coffee would generate an after-tax net present value of US$194 million at a 5% discount rate, along with an 18% internal rate of return.

“We’re feeling confident about the assumptions in our PEA, even though the market has changed since we released the results last year,” Thomas continued. “Gold prices are lower, but taking into consideration exchange rates ... many of the variables we used in the study are still relevant. It’s also vital to remember that in heap-leach terms, this is a high-grade deposit.”...ARTICLE CONTINUES...:

http://www.northernminer.com/news/site-visit-kaminak-on-track-to-build-the-next-yukon-gold-mine/1003729999/