On the last weekend in April, Kennecott Utah Copper reported it had resumed mining ore from its Bingham Canyon mine in Utah, less than a month after a massive landslide. Some 129,000 tons of ore were delivered to a crusher over a two-day period, a company spokesman said. The normal processing rate is 150,000 tons a day.
Slightly two weeks after a landslide sent 165 million tons of earth down into the world’s largest open-pit copper mine and covered portions of the floor up to 300 ft deep, mine officials have been able to take a closer look at the damage. The slide caused no injuries. Earlier in April, the Mine Safety and Health Administration cleared geologists and engineers from Kennecott Utah Copper, a subsidiary of London-based Rio Tinto, to enter the massive slide area that was created on April 10 in the Bingham Canyon mine, located west of Salt Lake City.