Test Heap Leaching At Santana Gold Project

TORONTO - Minera Alamos Inc. has now completed the second phase of its bulk testing heap-leach activities at its 100% owned Santana gold project in Sonora, Mexico. The Company is now performing a full review of the leaching results as part of if its final project evaluation prior to making commercial production decisions for the project.

Over the past year, the Company's wholly-owned subsidiary Corex Gold has been conducting continuous bulk heap-leach testing activities at the Santana gold project in accordance with its current test mining permit.  Following the successful completion of an initial phase that utilized coarse crushing (<3") only, the second phase involved fine crushing (<1.2-5/8') and agglomeration of the same mineralized material prior to leaching.  Ultimate gold recoveries from the second phase were excellent and consistent with those from the first phase of testing.   Approximately 5860g (~190 oz) of gold were recovered from a total of 9000 tonnes of material over a three month leach period – 0.65 g/t of recovered gold.   While the use of fine crushing/agglomeration appears to improve the gold leach kinetics, ultimate recoveries remained similar to those achieved leaching coarse material. 

"The results from the bulk heap leach testing program over the past year have been extremely positive.  The operation of the Santana test leaching facilities provides for a significant de-risking of the project by comparing laboratory scale metallurgical results to those achieved at a bulk scale under conditions similar to those envisioned for commercial operations." said, Darren Koningen, CEO of Minera Alamos. "To date, the Company has tested approximately 35,000 tonnes of mineralized material with ultimate gold recoveries exceeding expectations and appearing to be consistent over the range of crush sizes tested.  This creates an ideal environment for a robust commercial heap leaching operation at the Santana project site.  Once a final data review/optimization is completed, incorporating results from the upcoming drill program announced earlier this month, the Company expects to target the advancement of Santana as the first commercial mining operation from our portfolio of advanced stage gold projects."  

As done previously, the second carbon shipment from the test facility will be shipped later this week for desorption and precious metals recovery operations at Metals Research Corporation in Kimberly, Idaho.  Final doré is delivered for refining to Cascade Refining Inc. of Salt Lake City, Utah.