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Events/Disaster · 2013

Manefay landslides at Bingham Canyon

Disaster, 2013-04-10, United States.

What happened

On 10 April 2013 two landslides carried about 145 Mt of waste rock into the bottom of the Bingham Canyon pit in Utah. The Utah Geological Survey calls them the largest mining-induced landslides in history. No one was hurt, and the damage ran to hundreds of millions of dollars.1,2

Why it matters

UGS says Kennecott had a sophisticated network of geotechnical monitors in place.1,2

Story cards

Around the same time

  1. Panguna mine halted

    The closure became tied to the Bougainville conflict.3,4

  2. Privatisation of ZCCM weakens TAZARA's copper traffic

    More copper then went by road along southern routes and the Tanzam highway.5,6

  3. Northparkes block cave air blast

    Northparkes was the first block caving mine in Australia, and the Coroner's findings shaped how block caving is regulated there.7,8

  4. Falun Great Copper Mountain inscribed

    UNESCO World Heritage listing event.9

  5. Berkeley Pit cleanup settlement

    The EPA called it the nation's largest body of contaminated water.10,11

  6. Copiapo mining accident (33 miners trapped)

    Copiapo mining accident (33 miners trapped). Wikidata records 0 deaths.12

  7. Manefay landslides at Bingham Canyon

    UGS says Kennecott had a sophisticated network of geotechnical monitors in place.1,2

  8. Angola awards a 30-year Benguela Railway concession

    The Lobito Atlantic Railway consortium took over the Angolan line (some sources date the award to 2023).13,14

Open the full timeline

Where next

People

InspiredDaniel C. JacklingJackling built Bingham as the first big open pit. In 2013 two landslides filled its floor.1

Mines

Located inBingham CanyonSee the mine behind this story: Bingham Canyon.1

Sources

  1. Bingham Canyon's Manefay Landslides and the Future of the Mine Utah Geological Survey
  2. Bingham Canyon Mine (item Q2450901), coordinate location P625 Wikidata
  3. History: Panguna Mine Bougainville Copper Limited
  4. Panguna mine (item Q17060798), coordinate location P625 Wikidata
  5. 'Win-win' contested: negotiating the privatisation of Africa's Freedom Railway with the 'Chinese of today' Journal of Modern African Studies 59(1) (Cambridge University Press)
  6. Wikidata item Q239580 (Kitwe)
  7. 1999 Northparkes Air Blast case study (Learning from disasters) NSW Resources Regulator
  8. Parkes (item Q605513), coordinate location P625 Wikidata
  9. Mining Area of the Great Copper Mountain in Falun UNESCO World Heritage Centre
  10. US and Montana reach agreement with mining companies to clean up Berkeley Pit (25 Mar 2002) US Environmental Protection Agency
  11. Berkeley Pit (item Q820869), coordinate location P625 Wikidata
  12. Wikidata item Q214790 (Copiapo mining accident (33 miners trapped))
  13. From Transit to Transformation: Leveraging the Lobito Corridor (Angola Economic Update) World Bank
  14. Wikidata item Q223914 (Lobito)

From the Prospector Trails mining history dataset: each fact links to the source it was checked against. Figures are as the source gives them, in the money of their day. Not investment advice.

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Cover photos from Wikimedia Commons: Chuquicamata from the ISS by Alexander Gerst (ESA), CC BY-SA 2.0.