History and milestones
This timeline gives an at-a-glance picture of the history of Crew Gold Corporation (“Crew”) over the most recent five years. Our non-gold exploration projects have not been referred to.
- 2004
- Crew opened its first gold mine in southern Greenland, Nalunaq Gold Mine (“Nalunaq”), after several years of exploration and development.
- Nalunaq’s ore began shipment across the Atlantic to the El Valle plant of Rio Narcea Gold Mines in Spain for treatment.
- 2005
- Crew acquired 100% of Guinor Gold Corporation, the operator of the LEFA gold project (“LEFA”) in Guinea. The Government of Guinea held a 15% stake in the project.
- In conjunction with its associated Philippines partner, Crew also acquired the Masara Gold Project Mine (later known as “Maco”) in south-eastern Mindanao Island (Philippines) with the purchase of 72.9% of Apex Mining Company Limited, the Philippines listed Company holding title to the property license.
- 2006
- Crew acquired the remaining 15% of LEFA from the Government of Guinea.
- Crew’s exploration program yielded higher-grade satellite deposits at LEFA.
- Crew achieved the spin-off and separate Norwegian listing of its wholly owned subsidiary Crew Minerals ASA (subsequently known as Intex Resources ASA), which held a number of non-gold mineral properties.
- Crew began the upgrade of the Maco plant and machinery and conducted development-stage drilling.
- Crew began to negotiate a long-term ore-processing solution for Nalunaq to reduce costs and improve sustainability and completed the purchase of the Nugget Pond processing facility (“Nugget Pond”) in Newfoundland, Canada.
- 2007
- Crew’s update of reserves at LEFA showed an increase of 68% more than in 2005 so it became clear that the mine’s processing capacity would need to be upgraded considerably.
- Crew began an extensive upgrade program at LEFA.
- Crew completed the recommissioning of Nugget Pond in Newfoundland, Canada, as the new processing plant for Nalunaq.
- Crew disposed of the majority of its interest in Intex Resources ASA.
- 2008
- LEFA commenced commercial production on 1 July.
- Crew decided to suspend operations at Nalunaq, to stockpile ore for shipping to Nugget Pond and to move towards care and maintenance. The extent and high quality of Nalunaq’s resources simply didn’t outweigh the costs of mining the ore and shipping and processing it.
- Although activities were completed on schedule at Maco – such as the first phase of the tailings facility – with copper prices low and the outlook for Maco disappointing, Crew began to look for a buyer for its interest in Apex.
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- 2009
- Crew negotiated a one-year toll milling agreement for the Nugget Pond processing facility.
- Crew substantially completed the sale of Maco, the sale of the assets of Nalunaq and the disposal of Nugget Pond.
- 2010
- Endeavour Financial Luxembourg SARL purchased 37.9% of Crew Gold’s issued and outstanding common shares in a market transaction.
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