Looking forward

With the several larger Yukon mines listed below where will all that mineral ore go? We can sit back and wait to see what happens and be on the loosing end. Or we can be responsible people and work with all those involved to make an; orderly, environmentally safe, profitable, long term transportation and port facility. 

  As to transportation; When Bruce Carr, Director

, Strategic Planning Alaska Railroad Carrb@akrr.com was here he pointed out “you don’t have a port till you have a railroad”. That is very true as to move that much ore responsibly you need to move it by rail. Bruce also said “when rail comes to Haines not if rail comes to Haines”. That being the case we ALL need to help get Alaska Railroad to come to Haines.

  As to handling mineral ore we need a proper Ore Terminal at the Port. To give you a little idea of what size ore terminal; Wellgreen mine’s Neil Frock says; “The rough number for a building which would meet our needs is ~ 4,000 m2 (a little smaller than an NFL football field) of floor area for concentrate storage.

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Casino mine’s Jesse Duke says; “the project will ship an average of 407,000 tonnes of concentrate per year. While its complicated and I would have to review the details to confirm, I would expect that storage space of somewhere between 15,000 and to 30,000 tonnes at least would be required, plus loading facilities“.

At this point none of the mines have commited to come to Haines as we do not have any infrastructure. To that end Wellgreen’s Ron Monk says, “

The decision on the port will be made by Prophecy. The proposed Wellgreen Mine is in the pre-feasibility phase so a decision to proceed and what port to use is a while off. If Haines had adequate terminal, storage, dock, shiploader and upgraded highway bridge then Haines has a distance advantage over Skagway.”

As you can see this is a very large project that must be done in a responsible manner. Any real shipping is at least several years away. If we want to have a long term, good, clean, environmentally safe, over all small footprint economy we need to get busy now.

Bill Kurz

Check out Copper North mining Corp; http://www.coppernorthmining.com/s/Home.asp , Check out Chieftain Metals Inc. ; http://www.chieftainmetals.com/ , check out the Wellgreen Project; http://prophecyplat.com/project_wellgreen.php , Check out Capstone Mining Corp.'s Minto Mine; http://capstonemining.com/s/Minto.asp?ReportID=343888 , Check out the Selwyn Mine News; http://www.selwynresources.com/en/news_index.cfm , Check out The Casino Mine Latest Feasibility Study; http://www.westerncopperandgold.com/s/news.asp?ReportID=564587