OUTLINE ITINERARY:

Day 1 – Tuesday 17th August 2010
Afternoon – Flight from Brisbane to Mackay
Evening – Dinner and overnight stay in Mackay

Day 2 - Wednesday 18th August 2010
Morning – Bus trip Hail Creek mine. Presentation and tour of mine site
Afternoon – Bus trip to QR National’s Jilalan Railyard. Presentation and tour or Railyard facilities.
Evening – Return flight from Mackay to Brisbane

Rio Tinto’s Hail Creek mine
Hail Creek Mine, located 90 km south west of Mackay in central Queensland, supplies steel mills in Asia and Europe with up to 8 million tonnes of hard coking coal per annum. In 2001 Hail Creek Mine started construction and was officially opened in 2003. Hail Creek Mine is an open cut mine, using a dragline truck and shovel method. More than 600 employees work in shifts to keep the mine operational 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Hail Creek Mine's resources were discovered in 1968 with project feasibility work completed in the 1970s. After being washed and prepared for sale, the coal is loaded onto trains for transportation 100km to the Dalrymple Bay Coal terminal where it is shipped to international customers. Hail Creek Mine has marketable reserves of 179 million tonnes. Rio Tinto Coal Australia manages the operation on behalf of the joint venture partners, Queensland Coal Pty Limited (82 per cent), Nippon Steel Australia Pty Ltd (8 per cent), Marubeni Coal Pty Ltd (6.67 per cent) and Sumisho Coal Development Pty Ltd (3.33 per cent).

QRNational Coal’s Jilalan Rail Complex
QRNational Coal’s Jilalan Rail Complex is the major operations hub for Australia’s busiest coal rail corridor, the Goonyella system, and plays a pivotal role in Queensland’s multi-billion-dollar coal export industry. Located 35 kilometres south of Mackay, the complex is in the final stages of a $500 million yard upgrade,
which incorporated a new operations building, provisioning shed, over 42 kilometres of new rail lines, and a new wagon maintenance facility scheduled to come into service mid-2010. These new facilities are complemented by the existing Rolling Stock Maintenance Depot, where locomotive and wagon maintenance is conducted and the new 3700 and 3800-class electric locomotives are commissioned. Ten thousand-tonne payload trains run around the clock across the 924-kilometre network, delivering metallurgical and thermal coal from over 20 Bowen Basin mines to the Dalrymple Bay and Hay Point coal terminals for export to customers around the globe. Over 500 Coal North employees, including train crew, planning and logistics teams, rolling stock maintainers, tradesmen and support staff are based in the Jilalan complex.