10. Escondida Copper Mine
Located in the vast landscape of the Atacama Desert in Chile, the Escondida Copper Mine is one of the largest open pit mines in the world. Consisting of two open mines – Escondida Pit and Escondida Norta – the mine is 3.9 kilometer long, 2.7 kilometers wide and 645 meters deep. The mine ranks as the third deepest open-pit operation.Owners of the Escondida mine include BHP Billiton, which owns a 57.5 percent stake, and Rio Tinto, which owns a 30 percent interest.
9. Udachny Diamond Mine
The Udachny Diamond Mine, located in the Eastern-Siberian Region of Russia, is one of the largest open pit operations within Russia, and one of the largest and deepest in the world. Owned and operated by Russia’s state-owned company ALROSA, the open-pit operation has been in production since 1971 and is scheduled to close in 2015. The mine will reopen with underground operations and is expected to commenced commercial production by the end of 2015. According to Alrosa, there is an estimated diamond reserve of 108 million carats for Udachny underground mining.
8. Chuquicamata Copper Mine
For more than a century, the Chuquicamata Copper Mine in Santiago, Chile has been producing massive amounts of copper. Owned and operated by Codelco, the gigantic mine measures at 4.3 kilometers long, three kilometers wide and more than 850 meters deep, making it the second deepest open-pit mine in the world. According to Codelco, the company is planning to transition operations to underground by the end of 2018, which is estimated to contain 1.7 billion tons of copper reserves.
7. Grasberg Mine
In terms of gold mines, the Grasberg Mine is the Holy Grail of the mining world. The man-made hole ranks as the largest producing gold mine in the world and the second largest producing copper mine. The story of the Grasberg mine began in the mid-1930s when Dutch colonists discovered copper deposits in the Jayawijaya Mountain glaciers in the Indonesian part of New Guinea.
Located in the Papua province of Indonesia, the gold mine is operated by Freeport Indonesia – a subsidiary of Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold – and consists of both open-pit and underground operations, producing gold, copper and silver.
6. Hull-Rust-Mahoning Mine
What began as an underground mine has transformed into one of the biggest open-pit mines in the world. Nicknamed the “Grand Canyon of the North,” the Hull-Rust-Mahoning Mine in Minnesota, US measures a whopping eight kilometers long, 3.2 kilometers wide and 180 meters deep.Since 1895, the mine has shipped more than 800 million tons of iron and removed more than 1.4 billion tons of earth and 2,000 acres of land. The mine is so gigantic that it has become a national monument for Minnesota.
Source: http://www.miningglobal.com
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[Επιμέλεια: Π. Τζεφέρης]