Kennecott's Bingham Canyon Copper Mine

Utah: Kennecott's Bingham Canyon Copper Mine (largest open pit mine in the world actually the largest man made hole in the world) located 25-miles southwest of Salt Lake City.

May 29, 2007.

We spent the night with Cabella's I-15 exit 287 Lehi, UT about 25-miles south of Salt Lake City. Free with a dump station!

We stopped in this area so that I could visit Kennecott's Bingham Canyon Mine. Kennecott Utah Copper's Bingham Canyon Mine is one of Utah's most popular tourist attractions. There is a Visitors Center inside the mine that features informative exhibits and videos. Outside, from a viewing area, you can observe the operations of the world's first open pit copper mine.

Known as "The Richest Hole on Earth," this gigantic operation has yielded more than 17 million tons of copper metal, as well as vast quantities of gold, silver and molybdenum. It is the largest man-made excavation in the world.

Since open-pit mining began in 1906, more than 7 billion tons of material have been removed, creating a pit more than 3/4 of a mile deep and 2.5 miles wide. To put this in perspective the world's tallest building, the Sears Tower, 1454' tall, would reach only half way up the mine.

The mine was designated as a National Historic Landmark in 1966 by the United States Department of the Interior and in 1972 by the National Park Service.

Kennecott's Bingham Canyon Copper Mine

Only a portion of the trucks in the mine are hauling valuable rock. Remember 2/3 of the rock is overburden that must be removed to access the valuable ore bearing rock. Trucks in the picture to the left are removing overburden from the mine. This rock is having to be hauled out of the mine to be disposed of. Trucks transporting ore bearing rock have a much shorter distance to travel to that "in-pit-crusher" than the trucks having to carry their loads out of the mine. Bottom line many more trucks are involved in removing overburden than in hauling valuable ore. You can see the "in-pit-crusher" in the extreme left side of the picture on the right. It is not even 1/2 way up the wall of that huge hole. Look closely at the picture on the right and pick out the huge trucks hauling rock, some of it waste rock headed out of the mine others hauling ore bearing rock destined for the crusher.

In the picture to the left you can see four of those huge trucks carrying waste rock out of the mine, look behind the 2nd truck at the white pick up truck for something to gauge size with. These trucks are already above the in-pit-crusher where the ore bearing trucks are depositing their load, and these trucks still have a long way to go to exit the mine where they continue to the disposal site possibly a mile away.

Removing overburden from Kennecott's Bingham Canyon Copper Mine

Trucks like this remove 450,000 tons of material daily. Of this about 1/3 is ore that contains the valuable metals, and 2/3 is waste rock referred to as overburden.

Kennecott's Bingham Canyon Copper Mine

Kennecott's Bingham Canyon Copper Mine

Massive tire used on overburden haulers at Kennecott's Bingham Canyon Copper Mine

This is a tire used on one of those huge haulage trucks you see in the mine.

Truck Tire Facts at Kennecott's Bingham Canyon Copper Mine

Kennecott's Bingham Canyon Copper Mine

These two trucks are transporting overburden (waste rock) out of the mine.

Kennecott's Bingham Canyon Copper Mine

This is the Concentrating facility. That 5-mile conveyor belt from the "in-pit-crusher" ends at this building.

The "in-pit-crusher" reduced ore bearing rock to pieces no larger than basket balls. When these basket ball size rocks reach this building they are fed into huge cylinders filled with massive steel rollers. In this cylinder the ore, which contains only 0.6% copper, is mixed with water and ground to a consistency of face powder. Then through a flotation process, the ore is "concentrated" to 28% copper by removing unwanted materials.

Three products come out of this process:

1. The concentrated copper (silver, gold & molybdenum) and

2. A valuable by-product, molybdenum, is recovered and sold to steel manufacturers as a hardening agent.

3. The unwanted material (crushed ore that remains after the valuable metals have been removed). This is called tailings.

The unwanted material (tailings) is transported, as a slurry, in another pipe to a $500-million tailings impoundment around 15-miles from the mine.

The concentrated copper is transported, as a slurry, 17-miles through a large pipeline to the smelter located near the Great Salt Lake where I-80 and SR 201 intersect.

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Until next time remember how good life is.

Mike & Joyce Hendrix