Matthew Roberts
Bronze Member
- Joined
- Apr 27, 2013
- Messages
- 1,149
- Reaction score
- 5,076
- Golden Thread
- 0
- Location
- Paradise Valley, Arizona
- Primary Interest:
- All Treasure Hunting
Arizona H.R. 687 the Oak Flat Resolution Copper land swap is being voted on today.
Last week protestors and tribal chair members from the San Carlos Apache nation traveled to Superior High School to publicly oppose the passage of Arizona H.R. 687, the Southeast Arizona Land Exchange, also known as the Oak Flat Land Exchange. And to voice claims of cultural and NEPA (National Environmental Protection Agency) violations by congresswoman Ann Kirkpatrick District 1.
Chi’ Chil’ Ba Goteel. Arizona H.R. 687 is proposed and sponsored by Ann Kirkpatrick of Dist. 1 and Paul Gosar of Dist. 4. Kirkpatrick and Gosar planned to meet with the foreign owned, Resolution Copper Company just days before the Superior City Council election in which Soyla Peralta and Mila Lira were running for the same seat. Councilwoman Peralta and members of the Superior town council recently voted to oppose the land exchange during a special town meeting.
Resolution Copper Mining Co. is owned by Rio Tinto PLC United Kingdom, and BHP Biliton of Australia, foreign mining corporations. Rio Tinto and BHP are under contract and jointly working with the Government mining ministry of Iran on
a similar operation in the African interior.
In 1955 President Eisenhower set aside the Oak Flat reserve as part of the Tonto National Forest and to preserve sacred and cultural sites of the Pinal and San Carlos Apache tribes. Eisenhower’s proclamation insured the preserve would be, “ off limits to mining.”
Resolution Co. proposes a 7,000 foot, block cave mining operation on the preserve site.
For those who know underground mining, block caving is a dangerous and environmentally unsafe way to extract ore bodies. It is employed to mine massive low grade, steeply dipping ore bodies in high fracture rock.
In this block cave method, an undercut and haulage access is driven under the ore body in what is called a drawbell. The drawbell’s serve as the place for caving rock to fall into. The ore is drilled and blasted above the first undercut and falls into the drawbell. As ore is removed from the drawbell’s the ore body continues caving in, providing a steady stream of ore.
Hard rock miners know the flaws in this method all too well. If caving stops and removal of the ore continues, a large void forms, resulting in the potential for a sudden massive collapse accompanied by a deadly windblast throughout the mine.
Block caving was designed to work in rock that is heavily fractured. At Oak flats the rock from surface to 7000 feet is hard rock. The hard rock has to be preconditioned by blasting and hydraulic fracturing. Fracturing would require 40,000 acre feet of water each year. That might not sound like much to you but imagine an acre with water standing one foot high in it. Now multiply that by 40,000. An acre foot contains 43,560 cubic feet of water. Resolution would use 1,742,400,000 cubic feet of water a year for 30 years. And that water would be mixed with chemicals, oils and toxins creating a poisonous soup that would not be pumped back out of the mine, it would remain underground where it would mix with the deep water tables that the communities of Globe, Miami, Superior and San Carlos rely on. The same mineral belt that holds the rich copper deposits under Oak Flat continues NW under the Superstition mountains. Deep water under the Superstitions would eventually be contaminated by this block cave fracturing.
Oak Flat is a sacred area to the San Carlos Apache known as Gan Bi Kuh.
I urge everyone to support tribal chairman Terry Rambler and the San Carlos protestors and call or write Rep. Kirkpatrick and Gosar and voice your strong opposition to this land swap.
Matthew Roberts
Last week protestors and tribal chair members from the San Carlos Apache nation traveled to Superior High School to publicly oppose the passage of Arizona H.R. 687, the Southeast Arizona Land Exchange, also known as the Oak Flat Land Exchange. And to voice claims of cultural and NEPA (National Environmental Protection Agency) violations by congresswoman Ann Kirkpatrick District 1.
Chi’ Chil’ Ba Goteel. Arizona H.R. 687 is proposed and sponsored by Ann Kirkpatrick of Dist. 1 and Paul Gosar of Dist. 4. Kirkpatrick and Gosar planned to meet with the foreign owned, Resolution Copper Company just days before the Superior City Council election in which Soyla Peralta and Mila Lira were running for the same seat. Councilwoman Peralta and members of the Superior town council recently voted to oppose the land exchange during a special town meeting.
Resolution Copper Mining Co. is owned by Rio Tinto PLC United Kingdom, and BHP Biliton of Australia, foreign mining corporations. Rio Tinto and BHP are under contract and jointly working with the Government mining ministry of Iran on
a similar operation in the African interior.
In 1955 President Eisenhower set aside the Oak Flat reserve as part of the Tonto National Forest and to preserve sacred and cultural sites of the Pinal and San Carlos Apache tribes. Eisenhower’s proclamation insured the preserve would be, “ off limits to mining.”
Resolution Co. proposes a 7,000 foot, block cave mining operation on the preserve site.
For those who know underground mining, block caving is a dangerous and environmentally unsafe way to extract ore bodies. It is employed to mine massive low grade, steeply dipping ore bodies in high fracture rock.
In this block cave method, an undercut and haulage access is driven under the ore body in what is called a drawbell. The drawbell’s serve as the place for caving rock to fall into. The ore is drilled and blasted above the first undercut and falls into the drawbell. As ore is removed from the drawbell’s the ore body continues caving in, providing a steady stream of ore.
Hard rock miners know the flaws in this method all too well. If caving stops and removal of the ore continues, a large void forms, resulting in the potential for a sudden massive collapse accompanied by a deadly windblast throughout the mine.
Block caving was designed to work in rock that is heavily fractured. At Oak flats the rock from surface to 7000 feet is hard rock. The hard rock has to be preconditioned by blasting and hydraulic fracturing. Fracturing would require 40,000 acre feet of water each year. That might not sound like much to you but imagine an acre with water standing one foot high in it. Now multiply that by 40,000. An acre foot contains 43,560 cubic feet of water. Resolution would use 1,742,400,000 cubic feet of water a year for 30 years. And that water would be mixed with chemicals, oils and toxins creating a poisonous soup that would not be pumped back out of the mine, it would remain underground where it would mix with the deep water tables that the communities of Globe, Miami, Superior and San Carlos rely on. The same mineral belt that holds the rich copper deposits under Oak Flat continues NW under the Superstition mountains. Deep water under the Superstitions would eventually be contaminated by this block cave fracturing.
Oak Flat is a sacred area to the San Carlos Apache known as Gan Bi Kuh.
I urge everyone to support tribal chairman Terry Rambler and the San Carlos protestors and call or write Rep. Kirkpatrick and Gosar and voice your strong opposition to this land swap.
Matthew Roberts
