OK, I know many of us watched this tonight but does anyone know what was mined It was odd with all the creek bed type rocks lined in the shaft & working tunnels. They claim it was a gold mine, I wasn't convinced.

The plugging of the shaft using foam was very interesting for remote locations.

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Pioneering the next INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION (Preservation ! ). . . Saving equipment (1) mine site at a time.

I caught it... i was wondering about that too...... the guy said they were going for the material between all that rock.. whhhaaatt? Maybe its true but i'm skeptical. That was odd looking!

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This ain't longwall... this is long hole!

I disagree with that, I think the rocks were brought down there from a creek bed & they used morter to line the shaft & the tunnels using that rock. There is no way that there are that many round smooth rocks underground like that. I never saw a mine that was constructed like that either which made it interesting. I bet the workings were in there a ways what we saw were just the tunnels.

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Pioneering the next INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION (Preservation ! ). . . Saving equipment (1) mine site at a time.

anyone know when a rerun will be?

They were probally mining whats called placer deposits, the gold is in the silt inbetween the rocks. the rock layer that they were mining is composed of layers of material (called allevium) that was deposited in the bottom of a stream bed. a thick rock unit of this allevium can form over hundreds of thosands of years if conditions are right (sea level is rising). the gold that they were mining was eroded out of rocks in the highlands and carried to lower elevations by the stream, the gold settled to the bottom of the stream (along with rocks and other heavy particules) in areas where the water was moving slower.

i wonder how hard that foam gets after it cures...

not sure jim, but i bet it gets pretty tough if they were jumping on it! osm wanted me to seal a slope in tamaqua doing this. building a seal about 50 feet in then filling it with foam and finally they would have the surface graded over then. wanted to do it but had a big project at work that week and couldnt take off. oh well, they are looking into using this stuff more often so ill let you know if we get a chance to see or use it in person.

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i never heard of deep mining a placer deposit. i imagine it would present some serious challenges.

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-Thou shalt not little vein-

I with you on that one John. Not saying that it can't be done but wow would that be a challenge.

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Pioneering the next INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION (Preservation ! ). . . Saving equipment (1) mine site at a time.

There can be some interesting geology involved in gold mining. I fella I almost went to work for had a mine up near the 16 to 1 mine near Grass Valley and their ore body ran through 3 ancient lithified stream beds which were all about 20 to 100 feet under the surface of the mountain, they had a pretty good haul out of that hole too, all nuggets found in a near placer style deposit. Makes for very tricky ground control I'd imagine. Sometimes when going for that moly vein at the Ashdown mine it felt like we were mining through mud, and it wasn't far off you could pull at the face with your bare hands and break chunks off.

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Erik Novoa
Miner/ Railroader

A placer deposit is basically the buildup of valuable minerals between rocks, gravel, and sands. Generally the mineral mined would be gold, sometimes platinum. If you noticed, the entire mine was built entirely of small rocks compressed together. This was especially evident in the shaft and on the way down. They just broke through the rock and mined the minerals that were between the rocks.

The show was interesting.. The capping method looks strong right now, but its hard to say how long this will last. This is probably the most economical way to keep people out of those mines being so remote.

Miner Greg

With all the shaft caps deteriorating around here, it makes me wonder if they use that foam because it actually lasts longer that concrete would........................? I know concrete would be more of a pain and more expensive to put in, but would it hold up better? My dad actually uses quite a bit of that same foam. I should go plug a mine with it, old forge style.

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This ain't longwall... this is long hole!