VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA -- (Marketwire) -- 02/25/13 -- American Bonanza Gold Corp. (TSX: BZA)(OTCQX: ABGFF) ("Bonanza" or "Company") is pleased to announce progress at the 100% owned Copperstone gold mine in Arizona during January. During January, the tailings handling system issues that limited mill throughput were resolved and mill recoveries improved. Many aspects of the operation saw a continuation of the improving trend that the Copperstone Mine has experienced over the past few months. However, development mining, ore mining and processing were affected in January when a number of mining staff were unexpectedly affected by an outbreak of influenza that was widespread throughout Arizona and the rest of the US.
Whilst this was a short-term term event, it impacted Copperstone's manpower in January and therefore affected output and recovery performance. The mining team is now back to full strength, and early indications are that February will yield results similar to December, and that performance in March should improve further. The information below shows how the short-term influenza outbreak temporarily impacted output at the Copperstone Mine:
Production Summary (see below for detailed breakdown of figures)----------------------------------------------------------------------------Development Mining Oct Nov Dec Jan----------------------------------------------------------------------------Zones 3 5 5 less than 4----------------------------------------------------------------------------Development mined 153 t/d 337 t/d 302 t/d 146 t/d----------------------------------------------------------------------------Ore Mining----------------------------------------------------------------------------Total rock mined 291 t/d 605 t/d 612 t/d 463 t/d----------------------------------------------------------------------------Ore mined 139 t/d 269 t/d 310 t/d 317 t/d----------------------------------------------------------------------------Rounds per day mined greater than 2.5 5 5 5----------------------------------------------------------------------------Ore Processing----------------------------------------------------------------------------Ore processed 360 t/d 351 t/d 334 t/d 322 t/d----------------------------------------------------------------------------Mill recovery 72% 72% 68% 82%----------------------------------------------------------------------------Concentrates----------------------------------------------------------------------------Gravity concentrate 42 Oz/t 25 Oz/t 48 Oz/t 15 Oz/t----------------------------------------------------------------------------Flotation concentrate 17 Oz/t 13 Oz/t 69 Oz/t 23 Oz/t----------------------------------------------------------------------------Gold shipped 902 Oz 650 Oz 1,118 Oz 520 Oz----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Development Mining
During January, development mining extracted 4,536 tons of rock, compared to 8,752 tons during December. This was largely due to the manpower shortage experienced in January.
