GREAT COPPER MINE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20842, 8 April 1931, Page 5

GREAT COPPER MINE.

RESULT OF HUNTER'S SHOT. FORTY-TWO YEARS' OUTPUT. i , DISCOVERY BY MERE CHANCE. [from our own correspondent.] VANCOUVER, Feb. 1?. An Englishman, Dr. Forbes, roaming over the mountains within 20 miles of Vancouver m 1868, shot a buck. As lie was dragging the carcase down the slope the horns uncovered a green-stained rock and resulted in the discovery of Britannia, largest copper mine in the British Empire. In the succeeding 42 years Brittania has continuously been in production—tha longest span of production of any contemporary mine. During the prevailing depression, when the price of copper has glissaded to a point far below the normal cost of production, and when copper mines all over the world have been closing down, Britannia has not retrenched. The astonishing fact is officially recorded that "Britannia has cut production costs without decreasing output and without reducing workers or wages."

The property comprises 25.000 acres, extending from Howe Sound, an estuary of the Gulf of Georgia, over precipitous cliffs to Britannia Mountain, two and a-half miles above the beach. The mountain reaches to a height of 4400 ft. in the brief space. Workers and Their Camps, Hie number of employees ranges from 1200 to 1300, divided into six camps, 'lliose employed in the mill, foundry and shops reside at the beach settlement. At the head of the incline railway a mile east and 1600 ft. above the beach, train crews and car-shop mechanics live near the portal of the main haulage tunnel on the 2700 ft. level. Supplies and passengers are carried over an electric switchback railway three and a-half miles long, which connects Incline Camp with Tunnel Camp. About 3.000 people live in the mountain village at Tunnel Camp, 2200 feet above the bead;-, cut off from the outside world except for the narrow-gauge track leading to the waterfront. Continuing through the tunnel for a distance of two miles, thence mounting by a shaft, one reaches Victoria Camp. At other levels, and equally are the Empress and Barbara Camps. During summer a logging camp is maintained three miles from Victoria Camp. From all these giddy perches the miners and their families look down spruce and pine-clad slopes on seascape views, comparable with the Norwegian fjords, Milford Sound or Table Mountain.

'lhe mill is in the shape of a mammoth staircase ascending 300 feet above the beach. At the wharf are the general stores, a co-operative condern, which pays the consumer a dividend from 10 to 17 per cent. At the grinding machine 250 tons of steel balls, made from scrapped rails, are worn out monthly. Electricity is provided from a 7500 h.p. plant. The pipe-line from storage lakes in South Valley is four miles long, having cost about! £200,000. Few Specks to the Gallon. *

The copper-precipitation plant is an ingenious structure, consisting of 26 water-, i tight tanks built of wood, containing not a single nail. The water drained from the mine contains a small percentage of copper, a few specks to the gallon. When the water flow reaches 40,000 gallons per hour, the amount of copper recovered is considerable.

Britannia has mined rock containing 1 per cent, copper, which means that of every ton mined, 19 4-scwt. is useless rock. This rock has to be drilled, blasted, drawn to the 2700 ft. level, hauled to the incline, dumped, crushed, loaded into trucks at the 4100 ft. level, hauled to the mill, ground as fine as sand, passed .through the flotation process and the concentrates shipped to the smelter—all done to an ore which carries a value of 8s 4d to the ton!