Name: Pinos Altos mine.

Location: Pinos Altos is located 220 km west of Chihuahua, in the mountainous region of northern Mexico.

Controlling Company: Agnico Eagle Mines.

Brief History: Pinos Altos poured its first gold in July 2009 and achieved commercial production in November that year. Underground mining started in 2010. The nearby Creston Mascota satellite operation was built in 2010 as a standalone pit and heap-leach operation. It poured its first gold in December 2010 and achieved commercial production on March 1, 2011.

Brief Description: The Pinos Altos mine is a series of openpits and an underground mine along the Santo Niño fault, with a mine life to 2025. Creston Mascota is an openpit, heap-leach facility 7 km north-west of the Santo Niño pit.

Products: Gold and silver.

Geology/Mineralisation: Pinos Altos is situated in the Sierra Madre goldbelt, on the north-east margin of the Ocampo Caldera, which hosts many epithermal gold/silver occurrences. The property is underlain by volcanic and intrusive rocks intruded by faulting. Its geological focus is a horst structure –an uplifted block of rocks – at least 10 km × 3 km, defined by the Reyna de Plata fault to the north and the Santo Niño fault to the south.
All of the mineral reserves found on the property are in four zones hosted by the Santo Niño fault – the El Apache, Oberon de Weber, Santo Niño and Cerro Colorado lenses – as well as the San Eligio lens 600 m north of the fault. More than 55% of the current Pinos Altos mineral reserve is located in the steeply dipping Santo Niño vein zone, which is up to 40 m thick and 2.5 km long. It has a vertical extent of more than 750 m and remains open to the west and at depth.
There are several other promising zones on the property, including the Reyna de Plata and Sinter zones, which are part of the Reyna de Plata fault. On the west side of the large property is Creston Mascota and the Cubiro deposit, 2 km west of Creston Mascota, which remains open to the north-west and at depth.

Reserves: Total proven and probable reserves for the Pinos Altos mine as at December 31, 2014, were estimated at 18.23-million tonnes grading 3.01 g/t of gold and 79.65 g/t of silver.

Total proven and probable reserves for the Creston Mascota deposit as at December 31, 2014, were estimated at 5.84-million tonnes grading 1.25 g/t of gold and 13.47 g/t of silver.

Resources: Total Indicated resources for Pinos Altos as at December 31, 2014, were estimated at 11.94-million tonnes grading 1.84 g/t of gold and 44.14 g/t of silver. Inferred resources were estimated at 12.65-million tonnes grading 1.22 g/t of gold and 26.82 g/t of silver.

Indicated resources for the Creston Mascota deposit as at December 31, 2014, were estimated at 2.23-million tonnes grading 0.68 g/t of gold and 4.69 g/t of silver. Inferred resources were estimated at 4.46-million tonnes grading 1.07 g/t of gold and 13.98 g/t of silver.

Mining Method: Mining is by conventional openpit methods using shovels and trucks to remove ore and waste material. The Creston Mascota mine uses the same surface mining method as Pinos Altos.

Major Infrastructure and Equipment: Most of the Pinos Altos ore is treated in a processing plant. The conventional, 5 000 t/d process plant includes crushing, grinding, gravity concentration and agitated leaching, followed by counter-current decantation. Gold and silver are recovered using the Merrill-Crowe method, and a refinery produces gold/silver doré bars on site. Metals recovery in the plant is estimated at 94% for gold and 44% for silver over the life of the mine. The lower-grade Pinos Altos ore is treated in a heap-leach system designed to accommodate five-million tonnes of material over the life of the mine, contributing about 5% of the total metal production.

All the Creston Mascota ore is heap leached. The 4 000 t/d heap-leach facility at Creston Mascota is similar to the Pinos Altos facility, but the precious metals are recovered by a small carbon- column circuit. The gold and silver are stripped from the carbon in the Pinos Altos plant and then poured as doré bars, with expected ultimate gold recoveries of 65% and 16% for silver when leaching is completed.

Prospects: Agnico continues to evaluate several regional satellite opportunities. A 6 000 m infill and conversion drill programme is under way on the Sinter deposit. The results are scheduled to be incorporated into a scoping study along with metallurgical testing and geotechnical data to better understand the development potential of this zone.

Geotechnical fieldwork is under way on the Phase 4 leach pad at Creston Mascota. Evaluation of the Bravo satellite zone will continue, with a 5 000 m infill and conversion drilling programme expected to start around mid-2015.

Contact: Corporate communications.

Contact Details:
Agnico Eagle,
tel +1 416 847 8669,
fax +1 416 367 4681, and
email media@agnicoeagle.com.