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Mt Polley: More Questions, No Answers
I write this fifty percent in jest, fifty percent in earnest, fifty percent with tounge in cheek, and fifty percent as a concerned citizen. You decide which is which in what follows, for I cannot...
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Mt Polley: Rumours & Sabotage
A few notes on things heard recently about Mt Polley. I was told this is all public knowledge, although I have not read any of it on the web. First I am told the Thurber Engineers is engaged by the...
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Brazil Tailings Dam Failure: Herculano, Itabirite
Just got news of the failure of a tailings facility in Brazil. I can find no English versions of the news. There are many reports in Portuguese, and you can get them translated via Google. They...
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Geosynthetics in Mining: Conference Wrap-Up
We have just finished the InfoMine Conference on geosynthetics in mining. I think it was a success although I had better await the evaluation forms before coming to definitive conclusions. The...
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Brazil Tailings Failure: More Information
A little bit more on the failure of that tailings facility in Brazil from some-one on the ground: The accident was in a very small mine close to Belo. It was an old tailings dam that was not supposed...
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Roundup of the Mining Peripheral
To end the week, here are a few unrelated postings on the web about things mining. At this link, David Stockman of North American Business Development gives an interview on the topic Dry Tailings...
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Artaserse and Weekend Opera
Artaserse is an opera with five countertenors. This is how opera was in the beginning. Women were not allowed on the stage and castrati were in abundance. Thus in the modern times, five...
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Mt Polley: Directive 74 or Bust
I have written extensively in this blog about the Alberta Directive 74. Generally I have been derogatory about the Directive. For example at this link I write the following: That incredibly silly...
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Australian Geologist Salaries
I repeat below the entire article from InfoMine’s Career Mine. It is by Susan Kihn who does a fine job of setting out the facts. Even with the downturn in mining worldwide which has seen massive job...
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Born Liberal or Conservative? Mining via Gilbert and Sullivan.
Woke up late this morning after twelve hours sleep—seems the older I get the more I want to sleep. Maybe it is old age or maybe riding my bicycle to work tires out the old body. Or maybe there is...
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University of Arizona Mining Engineering Students’ Intern Stories
The best read of the week is at this link where you can read the stories of mining engineering students at the University of Arizona College of Engineering. The stories are about their internships....
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Swedish Tailings Dam Failure
The translation above the pictures reads: It doesn’t matter that it is Sweden’s most modern mine, built according to environmental laws, which the Government says is the world’s strongest. In...
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Mining Travel in Peru
No posts the past few days. I have been travelling in Peru and Chile to remote mines where we work long hours and have intermittent email & internet connections. It has been fun and instructive: to...
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Simple Tailings Cover is Too SImple
A simple cover for a tailings facility may be no more than a layer of compacted tailings overlain by soil in which vegetation can grow. If control of infiltration is not required, this cover may be...
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Tailings and Mine Waste 2014 Day 1.
A beautiful sunny day in Keystone in the Colorado Rockies and the first day of the conference on Tailings and Mine Waste 2014. Today was short-course Sunday. With Franco Oboni and Cesar Oboni of...
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Tailings and Mine Waste 2014: Mt Polley in Focus
The first day of presentations at the Tailings and Mine Waste 2014 Conference. Gordon McPhail delivered a talk in honor of Geoff Blight, who passed away earlier this year. Geoff made so many...
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Tailings and Mine Waste 2014: Freeport-McMoRan’s Tailings Management Program
Today’s keynote address was by Tamara Johndrow of Freeport-McMoRan Mining Company. Her topic was FCX Tailings Stewardship Program. Let me note what I recall of her talk. Tamara heads a group of about...
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Craig Benson on Rock Cover Performance
The final keynote speech at the conference on Tailings and Mine Waste was from Craig Benson. He talked about mine waste facility covers. He has promised me a pdf of his talk. But in the meantime...
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Tema Isenmann and Multotec
Just home from a four-week journey that took me to Peru, Chile, Keystone CO, Banff, and Ekati NWT. It is good to be back in the house where you can throw off the formalities of travel, eat simple...
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Mt Polley: More Ideas and More Consultants
At this link is an announcement that the BC regulators are seeking proposals from consultants to help them evaluate the independent dam safety analyses they have ordered be done by independent folk on...
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