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 Post subject: Bingham Pit Landslide
PostPosted: Wed Apr 24, 2013 6:18 am 
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Joined: Thu Jun 04, 2009 6:13 am
Posts: 237
Location: New Zealand
Colossal landslide at the Bingham copper pit in Utah.

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/8655 ... -Mine.html

Having visited there a couple of times, I'm impressed at the size of it. A fair number of Tonka Toys need exhuming.

Chris
in New Zealand

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 Post subject: Re: Bingham Pit Landslide
PostPosted: Wed Apr 24, 2013 7:20 am 
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Joined: Tue Mar 12, 2013 9:21 am
Posts: 179
Location: United States
They weren't using rail here anymore, were they? I know that at one time they were using standard gauge electric trains but I think they got rid of all the "juice jacks" some time ago. Are there any diesel operations left? It seems to me like TRAINS Magazine had an article about this mine a number of years ago.

Regards,
Fred M. Cain


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 Post subject: Re: Bingham Pit Landslide
PostPosted: Wed Apr 24, 2013 8:37 am 
That was some place in Canada.When I get home early today (HALF DAY! OORAH!) I'll check my dad's back issues of Trains and find what mine. I recall reading that they were giving the steeple cabs to anyone willing to pay to move them! (Basically, the locos were free, it was the shipping that you paid for.[Sounds like a commercial!])


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 Post subject: Re: Bingham Pit Landslide
PostPosted: Wed Apr 24, 2013 12:09 pm 
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Joined: Tue Mar 12, 2013 9:21 am
Posts: 179
Location: United States
Dave,

I think that'd be the huge nickel mine in Sudbury. They actually had (have?) a very complex rail operation using various gauges on the surface and underground.

However, I believe the Utah mine also used rail in their open-pit. At one time it was electric. Does anybody remember this? There was also a huge open pit mine in Montana that used rail and juice jacks.

Arizona had two huge open pit copper mines that used rail. One at Morenci and the other at Ajo (pronounced AH-hoe). However, these were definitely diesel.

The huge "Lavender Pit" open copper mine at Bisbee used trucks and no rail. In fact, I'm not sure there are any open pit mines still using rail. Does anybody know? If there is it might be the mine in Utah which according to the TRAINS article, still had some limited rail operations in the late 1980's, I think it was. Now that I think about it, that article was longer ago than I first thought.

Regards,
Fred M. Cain

P.S.!! I just found a nice picture online of the Bingham Canyon mine. Definitely diesel by the time this was shot but the wires were still hangin'. Note the automatic block signal system in the background!

Image

F.M.C.


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 Post subject: Re: Bingham Pit Landslide
PostPosted: Wed Apr 24, 2013 3:01 pm 
The diesel looks like a CF7 rebuild. I think that the lines were still hanging because they were used to carry power into the pit. notice the tipped over car on the second level below the train.


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 Post subject: Re: Bingham Pit Landslide
PostPosted: Fri Apr 26, 2013 10:17 pm 
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Joined: Sat Nov 19, 2011 10:49 pm
Posts: 9
does the slide contain any recoverable ore? as bad as it is it might actually make removal of valuable ore easier in that no drilling and blasting will need to take place.


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 Post subject: Re: Bingham Pit Landslide
PostPosted: Fri Apr 26, 2013 10:30 pm 
If it is a pit mine, then likely not. they are following the ore downwards, so any recoverable ore would be at the bottom of the slide. It would take weeks (months?) to get to it, and then it probably would not be cost effective to refine the ore, because it would be very mixed in with the waste rock.

How did I do, guys??


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 Post subject: Re: Bingham Pit Landslide
PostPosted: Wed May 01, 2013 2:14 pm 
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Joined: Mon Jun 20, 2005 11:33 pm
Posts: 3080
Location: Above the Sterling Hill Mine
Latest official news:

Kennecott held a press conference yesterday to provide an update on the situation with the Bingham Canyon mine landslide. This is well reported in a number of online newspapers, including Deseret News and ABC News. The openness and transparency of the mine operators in light of this situation remains both admirable and commendable. The nature of the challenges that the operators face in digging out the landslide are notable however. To my mind the most important components of the media briefing were:

The upper part of the slide will have to be removed to make mining safe;
The majority of the ore lies under the slide
The landslide mass is 150 million tonnes (which is about 60 million cubic metres).

The largest mining dump trucks can carry about 350-400 tonnes per load, which means that there hauling even a fraction of the landslide mass is going to be a major challenge. A very interesting aspect of this is going to be how the head scarp area of the landslide is to be treated, as shown on the image below (from the Kennecott Utah Flickr page, used with permission):

The obvious mass that needs to be removed is in the floor of the mine, but it is possible that some of the mass in the head scarp area is also potentially unstable. If so, this may need to be stabilised first. This is not a trivial job in itself.

The mine gave members of the media the opportunity to visit the site yesterday. I am somewhat jealous as I would love to see this remarkable landslide!

http://blogs.agu.org/landslideblog/2013 ... landslide/


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 Post subject: Re: Bingham Pit Landslide
PostPosted: Wed May 01, 2013 2:31 pm 
is a tonne a long ton or a short ton (2000 lbs)?


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 Post subject: Re: Bingham Pit Landslide
PostPosted: Thu May 02, 2013 5:12 am 
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Joined: Thu Jun 04, 2009 6:13 am
Posts: 237
Location: New Zealand
Miner Dave wrote:
is a tonne a long ton or a short ton (2000 lbs)?


Neither, a Tonne is a Metric "ton" of 1000 kg, which Google :) says is 2204.62 lbs.

Chris
in New Zealand

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 Post subject: Re: Bingham Pit Landslide
PostPosted: Thu May 02, 2013 8:22 am 
ok. thank you. all the different versions of a ton confuses me. You have the "Long ton" which can be said ton, and the short ton, which is commonly called a ton and then the tonne. I'm not going to get into the "kiloton".


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