HL Hecla Mining Company

Item 5.02 Departure of Directors or Certain Officers; Election of Directors; Appointment of Certain Officers; Compensatory Arrangements of Certain Officers

The Board of Directors (“Board”) of Hecla Mining Company (the “Company”) determined to increase the size of the Board, and appointed Catherine “Cassie” Boggs as a Class II director (standing for election in 2018), to fill the resulting vacancy. Ms. Boggs was also appointed to serve on the Audit and Corporate Governance and Directors’ Nominating Committees. She will be eligible to receive standard director and committee fees, and to receive grants under the Company’s Stock Plan for Nonemployee Directors and the 2010 Stock Incentive Plan, all as described under the caption “Compensation of Non-Management Directors” in the Company’s proxy statement for its 2016 Annual Meeting of Shareholders, which was filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on April 4, 2016.

There are no arrangements or understandings between Ms. Boggs and any other person pursuant to which she was appointed to the Board, and there are no relationships between Ms. Boggs and the Company that would require disclosure under Item 404(a) of Regulation S-K of the Exchange Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended.

Ms. Boggs has been the Vice President and General Counsel of Resource Capital Funds (USA) (a private equity firm), since January 2011. Prior to that, she was Senior Vice President – Corporate Development for Barrick Gold Corporation from 2005 to 2010, where she also served as President and CEO of a joint venture company mining copper and gold in Pakistan (Tethyan Copper). She was President of the Rocky Mountain Mineral Law Foundation from 2012 to 2013, and has previously served as a member of the Mining Committee of the International Bar Association.