Hi All,
Today was the first day of the Tubac Arts & Crafts Festival. Sandy spent the day shopping ("I turned all my $20 bills into singles" ;-).
Carl went on a tour of the local ASARCO MISSION copper mine. This place is huge, an open pit nearly 1,500 feet deep ( right down to the water table) and hundreds of acres of tailing ponds and mountains of overburden (the 300 feet of dirt that has to be removed to get to the copper ore).
They use huge trucks here. This one has a capacity of 170 tons and was taken out of service as too small!
The new trucks like this one carry 320 tons of ore, cost $4 million each and have six, 11 foot tires that are replaced every six months at a cost of $60,000 each!
This panorama shows the deep mine pit.
This terraced landscape is overburden that is being removed. The gigantic shovels on the right fill the trucks with four scoops. The drills on the left are making holes for explosives to blast loose the overburden.
Haul Truck load of overburden on the way to add to the mountain. Note the size compared to the pickup truck.
South mill, one of two plants that convert basketball size rocks to talcum powder fine, 28% copper ore.
Part of the process is this Ball Mill that rolls ore with steel balls to break it down.
This concentrator pond collects the enriched ore. As a byproduct they collect enough gold to pay their $1.5 million monthly electric bill.
It was a fascinating tour and copper is very important even though this mammoth open pit mine is an incredible eyesore. If Arizona was a country, it would be the fourth largest copper producer in the world.
We are now in our last week at Sonoita Creek. Amazing how fast our time here has flown.
We are now in our last week at Sonoita Creek. Amazing how fast our time here has flown.
Love
Sandy & Carl
Living & Traveling in our Motorhome
Volunteering across America
617-435-8502
Photographed and sent from Carl's iPhone
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