A plant technician stamps a gold ingot at Midway
Gold’s Pan mine. (Photo courtesy of Midway Gold)

As of March 27, approximately 3.4 million st of ore had been stacked on the Pan leach pad, and about 2.6 million st were under leach. Midway expects to add an additional 5.9 million st of ore to the pad through the remainder of 2015. A planned leach pad expansion is on schedule to increase capacity from approximately 8 million st to 20 million st by the end of 2015.

Pan is Midway’s first producing mine. The property is located at the northern end of the Pancake mountain range in western White Pine County, 50 mi west of Ely, Nevada. Lifeof- mine gold production is planned at 864,000 oz over a mine life of 8 years. Midway estimates the cost to complete construction of the project at $84 million.

Ledcor is the Pan project mining contractor. Ore is being mined from two open pits, North and South, with ore from both pits processed on a central leach pad. Mine production is planned at 55,000 st/d.

Studies are ongoing to review Pan resource modeling; ore control practices, including blast hole sampling; and assaying practices. Midway will announce formal 2015 production and cost guidance after the resource modeling studies are complete.

Pan is a Carlin-style, epithermal, disseminated, sediment-hosted gold system. The gold mineralization occurs in elongate breccias along the Pan fault and along sedimentary bedding near unit contacts. The resource outcrops at the surface and is entirely oxide mineralization.

Midway began a reverse circulation infill drilling program on March 10, with drilling planned at 10,500 ft in approximately 30 holes less than 500 ft deep. The company expects the drilling to test and confirm material in the South pit, as well as to support ongoing operations and planning. Midway also has plans for an exploration drilling program this year to target possible expansion of the resource at the South pit.