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Message: ECU annual meeting stuff

ECU annual meeting stuff

posted on Jun 28, 2008 09:12AM

As usual the meeting went well with lots of questions to Michel and Steve. I won't review all the stuff but highlight a few things.

1/ Drilling deep below Santa Juana targeting deep massive sulphides at what is geologically projected as the same level as San Diego and Santa Maria mines massives. This inside the mine drill gallery has been positoned to allow 5-7 deep holes after taking a couple of months to create. If semi to massive sulphides are hit and are mineralized start to think much more than the present one billion ounces, much more!!

BTW, the impact of this massive sulphide discovery at San Diego is very significant and could be very large on the developing resource calculations. Of course any discovery at Velardena under the Santa Juana mine would be even much larger and much more significant given the much larger and more extensive mineralized structures defined to date (veins and minerailzed corridor), a definite case where size matters.

2/ Recent meetings with a number of mining companies have revealed that they upon their analysis they see the ECU inferred resource as closer to M&I and a significant part of the potential as closer to inferred based on how they classify their own resources. In other words our potential is closer to inferred than the classical definition of potential as defined by national instrument 43-101 guidelines which I have always suggested. These are the comments of those running other resource companies and I might add the ECU personnel suggested they other companies were pleasantly surprised to say the least.

3/ New pad built to inventory 10,000 tonnes of concentrate as part of the new production plan. This is over and above existing storage space which was inadequate and is now filling up. Update on production and concentrate agreement to follow in 2-3 weeks.

4/ Testing on existing pyrite concentrate going well with a couple more tests planned. Suggested final solution may be reported in 6-8 weeks. This would also allow the startup of the 60 tonne per day mill to process tailings which contain over $25 million dollars of gold and silver, mostly gold.

5/ New road built between the mine and mill. The large new ramp to the lower levels at Santa Juana is progressing well and about 1/3 complete. This ramp will allow easy access to areas of the mine not yet well explored due to access difficulty and of course is the key to future large scale mine plan for processing muck for a very large scale operation being contemplated by the feasibiltiy study. The plan shown on slides outlined the plan as going to 1500 tpd with phase 2 taking the mill to 5000 tpd. Steve and Michel made it clear the company has over 600,000 data points to date from over 13,000 samples provided by exploration drifting, crosscuts and extensive drilling. Plus we have processed bulk samples of the Mineralized Corridor and mined high grade veins so extensive info exists for the feasibility study.

6/ From an infrastructure standpoint, the company is hooked up to hydro, a major highway runs right by the mill/mine, we have access to huge existing underground workings/developments plus extensive drill results, a politically very safe environment and it's all in one location. Not to mention one billion ounce potential verified by a world class engineering firm in Micon and huge potential to grow this number higher as lots of new exploration upsdie exists, maybe as much as discovered to date.

7/ Expect a revised 43-101 in the fall followed by the pre-feasibility study. One of the issues with the feasibility study is a great problem to have, the company continues to have high exploration success making the study a moving target on mill design and size. This should be able to move faster once results from the deep holes are available as success here will again change the required mine and mill developement plans.

8/ Last but not least, we already have 260 trained and dedicated personnel at ECU giving us a huge leg up on almost any other developing operation in Mexico.

These are some highlights only and from memory as much was presented and discussed at the meeting. Sorry for the delay as I'm sure some were hoping comments would be posted earlier.

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