My dad retired two years ago and now works full time at the Kennecott Mine. In all my years living here I have never been to the mine, the visitor center or anything. It is really quite fascinating. Kennecott had a family day on September 20th for employee's and their families. We were all very happy to go, especially because it was dad's day off and he was able to go with us. We didn't go to the mine itself but we had a special tour of the concentrator where they crush all the rocks to a fine powder and mix different chemicals to get the different ore out of the powder.
On the bus tour portion of our day
Entering the concentrator with our safety gear on.
At the mine they remove all the rocks and ore and send it to the concentrator (which is to the north of the mine) on a 5 mile conveyor belt.
It was amazing to see the process and the kids had so much fun too. We had to wear protective eye wear and also ear plugs. It was stinky in there because they use sulfur and other chemicals -Emily had to put a pair of nose plugs up her nose so she didn't have to smell it. They provided lunch for us and also a canvas bag of stuff, which included a flashlight, a 20 year commemorative coin since the concentrator has been operating for 20 years now.
It was a fun family day. We were sad that Colby couldn't be with us and the rest of his family. We really think he would have liked to see how everything works too. Science is amazing!
Dad stayed out with Jaxsen the first round, only kids 5 and older could enter the concentrator. My kids loved it so much they wanted to go again, so we went back inside a second time so grandpa could see the action too.
These big drums behind Joe and Hayley are where rocks are placed first. Those are agitators or what they call ball mills, they have big steal balls in them that crush and break up the rocks. There are maybe 8 to 10 of these giant things working at the same time, so it is really loud. After the rocks are through with this process they are dropped out onto a conveyor belt (much smaller) and transfered over to the next piece of equipment that breaks them down even more and so on and so forth, until they are a fine powder.
A video of the ball mills:
This is the molybdenum floatation where they get all the molydebenum out of the rocks. The picture doesn't do it justice. I was really cool. It reminded me of big bubbles of mercury floating over the sides.
I forgot I took a video if you would like to see click play.
LUNCH
I thought this port-a-john was funny. Had to take a picture.
Our bus ride back to the parking lot where our cars were parked.
