Journey Into The World's Largest Underground Copper Mine
By Abdul Aziz Harun
KUALA LUMPUR, May 27 (Bernama) -- A group of Malaysian journalists who were in Chile recently had the chance to see something different from the usual eye candy tourism, a view of the world's largest underground copper mine.
It was a journey deep inside the mountains of the Los Andes Range, in a rugged copper mining facility called El Teniente, near a mining town called Sewell located 85 kilometers south of Santiago, Chile's capital.
The trip was made possible by Malaysian Ambassador in Chile Abdullah Faiz Zain who took the initiative to arrange the visit for the media.
The excitement was just too much to bear, especially when the group arrived at a special room to be equipped with some gadgets required to be worn inside the underground mine after a short briefing.
LIKE IN THE MOVIES
The visitors were required to wear a helmet equipped with electric light, a safety belt complete with the battery for the light, a fluorescent jacket and boots.
One of the visitors noted that the panorama resembled a James Bond movie set up where the super spy destroyed the the super villian's secret hideout underground, a state-of-art complex buried deep inside the mountain.
While the super villian hideout does not exists here, the facilities provided deep underground is real and equally remarkable with some 2,500 kilometers of tunnel networks constructed deep inside the mountain.
"We have nine restaurants, two hospitals, even a train station among others, inside this 14 level facility deep in this mountain alone", said the guide, Romolo Giraudo Hellman when met at El Teniente recently.
El Teniente is one of the five principal operating divisions run by the Chilean company, Codelco, or Corporacion Nacional del Cobre de Chile (National Copper Corporation of Chile) the world's main copper producer. Other four are the Codelco Norte, Salvador, Andina and Ventanas.
A DIFFERENT WORLD UNDERGROUND
Hellman said the world's largest copper producing company is 100 percent owned by the government and produced 1.66 million tonnes of the metal in 2007, that covers 11 percent of the world's total, and it also owns the world's largest known copper reserves and resources.
He said the company has more than 18,000 workers, with about 3,500 of them stationed at El Teniente.
The visitors were then bundled into a van to begin the journey into the tunnel that goes straight inside the breathtaking beautiful mountain of the Los Andes Range. The particular mountain is about 2,500 meter from the sea level.
It was dark, bit spooky, so be sure you don't venture alone or get lost in one of the tunnels. Hellman was always there shouting "SEMUA SEKALI" to make sure that nobody was left behind and it was the only two Bahasa Malaysia words that he learnt that day.
Along the journey, some 10 kilometers by van and by foot through the dark tunnel, Hellman had many stories to tell.
A LABYRINTH OF PASSAGES
Since 1905, some 2,500 kilometers of tunnels have been constructed in the mountains, of which some 800 kilometers are still in use, and each year about 64 kilometers of new tunnels and galleries are being excavated.
In one of the tunnels, the visitors witnessed a bulldozer that worked its way through the narrow tunnel, digging through the walls and dumping the ore into a big hole to be transported outside and processed.
Then there was the control room, where according to Hellman in the near future, not only the mining work can be done in the comfort of one's living room, but it can also be done in a living room thousands of miles away from the mountain.
The drilling, blasting and rock crushing works can be carried out with a push of a button in this control room, and everything can be monitored from the internal cameras.
One would think that it would be very stuffy and warm, deep inside these tunnels, but the visit proved otherwise.
A FAIRY TALE ENDING
Rommel said the facility had some 20 huge ventilation motors to maintain the temperature and the environment inside so that it is comfortable for the workers.
Then the visitors were ushered to another level to be enthralled by yet another remarkable sight, a visit to "La Caverna de los Cristales", a tight locked up cavity that has gypsum crystals several meters long, with diameters comparable to large tree trunks.
When this cavity was opened up, it was so spectacular that the mining company preserved it from destruction and coloured lights have been placed behind these crystals giving the cavern a fairyland appearance.
A trip to El Teniente is not complete without a visit to the Sewell Mining town just outside the mountain.
Sewell, also known as the "city of stairs," was constructed in 1905 at 2,130 meters above sea level to house the miners but was abandoned in the early 1970s.
Today, three years after Unesco's World Heritage Committee listed it as one of the 10 new sites on World Heritage List, it provides a small museum for the visitors to browse through the history of the place.
-- BERNAMA
Last year, the Embassy undertook a similar visit to the El Teniente copper mine and Sewell, the City of Stairs. Below are some of the photographs of the visit: