Return to Tecopa - Mineshaft Exploration

Therrin

Howdy folks!

Alright so recently I got back from another mineshaft exploring trip. We revisited one of the area's I had originally hit earlier this year, near the little town of Tecopa, just south of the Death Valley area in California.

At the moment I've only sorted out a few pictures. I've been busy the last few days and I'm still sorting out my 6gig of video's and going to see about editting some of them down a little.

GoPro Helmet Cam:

The helcam I used on this trip works excellent! HOWEVER.... I need to adjust my lighting systems for use with videography, apparently. My helmet-mounted and handheld lighting systems, while great for seeing far off into dark recesses, are not so great for taking videos with. I need to convert to a more "flood" style of lighting. My cam was picking up the "hot spot" of light I was putting out with my "throw" beams, and was as a result creating very narrow, very small aperature shots, which don't have very much peripheral size or width to them.
On my next trip I'll be using gell diffusion paper over the bezel of some of my lights, as well as a clip-on diffuser I got for my Fenix HP10 headlamp. This should correct the problem for future videos.

Picture 5 is a photograph I took of a picture I saw at the Museum in Shoshone, which I thought was particularly hilarious. And Picture 6 is a series of rock cave dwellings that were dug using pics and shovels, and fitted with doors and chimneys. They were lived in around the turn of the century.

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We actually camped 300ft down inside the War Eagle mine. This mine system is MASSIVE. We were inside the south portal, and the west portal is located a mile away as the crow flies, but is a good 5 levels above the level of the southern portal. This mile has roughly at least a half dozen miles of tunnel systems.
While inside the War Eagle, we were 8 hours in on our 2nd exploration run and I found a stoped out area which had a pile of tools. I found a 90 year old hand forged miners pick and shovel, wooden rods for tamping dynamite down bore holes, rock bits and drill rods for boring out holes in the rock, and a hand-forged crowbar...thing. I brought home the pick and some rock drills, as well as the dynamite box, a blasting cap box, blasting cap instructions, and several sections of old fuse cord. We also actually found dynamite, but the pictures of it are on in my friend's files.

In the Gunsite mine I found newspapers buried in rubble and debris that are from the early 1920's, and brought home a whole bundle of assorted pieces that I was able to carefully excavate and remove.
In the gunsite mine we climbed a 2 section ladder area of 200' runs of rickety & broken wooden ladders; some of which were only secured to timbers in the raise (vertical shaft) by hand forged nails. Climbing that section was very spooky and somewhat crazy, but we found the newspapers at the top, and good evidence that noone had been there in many, many years. (probably because the fall would definitely kill you).
Coming off the same level as the ladders were a machine room, where I got the picture with me next to the cable spool. That spool was used to haul ore carts up an incline shaft which was adjacent to that room. That incline shaft ran downward, roughly 600ft, and where it ended. Or so we though. There was a small 18" opening we had to take our packs off to wriggle through, which dropped us into another drift system which had ore carts in it (Picture 4).

More pics and vids will follow as I sort things out.

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sueann

Holy smoke Ken!! that is the scariest bunch of women I've ever seen, including some I saw at the gay mardi gras down Sydney once, they were carrying whips and chains..the ladies in your pic do not need whips and chains to scare anyone!

Those rock house thingys look interesting.

Therrin

Yes, I think besides the liquor they needn't worry about anyone's lips touching theirs in the first place. But there's a good chance noone had told them that!

More pics. These are all from the Gunsite mine.
The general area, the ore bin, mine opening, machine room & incline shaft (its a 45deg decline actually, right across from the spool mount), & the totally crazy 400' ladder system. (keep in mind while looking, the ladders run at a 80 to 90 degree angle, almost straight up and down).

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This last section with the broken ladder section and the one above it hanging by two nails was the VERY TOP of the entire 400' total run of ladders.

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Drouin Tree Service

Wow i don't think i could go that far down!!!

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Eric Frei

Look out Indiana Jones!

and great story.

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Garry Brockley

Nice one ken you look like youve had a ball! my only question is where are those beautiful women now? wow im so in love i hope they have offspringthat look just like them, they must be so proud of that modelling style picture, step aside the super models the real beauties are here.
how did you descend down the shafts? were you roped in?

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sueann

Therrin, John just asked me to ask you what type of metalliferous mine it was, if you know. He reckoned it wasn't a coal mine but why he thinks that I have no idea. He thinks maybe gold?

He also asked if it was certified as safe to trawl or do you just take the chance, do you need permission? And if you knew how old it was.

sueann

Oh no!! Galbee's in love!

Therrin

Galbee, the incline shafts are somewhat steep, but at 45 to 60 deg's, aren't so steep that ropes are needed (usually, though some are).

The ladder system there was basically nothing to rope off TO. There were old timbers inset to the walls in a square, every 20 ft or so, but roping off to them would be a gamble anyway. There'd be a good chance you'd just pop one out of place and then it'd fall on top of you. So the ladders I just climbed up, and down...very very carefully. Four hundred feet of butt-clenching craziness. From the top you could rappell down, but on doubled rope you'd need about 820ft, and ... yeah, not happening. I do have that much rope, but then I'd be passing knots on double line; plus I'd have to carry the weight of it all UP the ladders, and that's not a great idea.

Sueann, mon petit chou...

Most mines out here in Ca are still SOMEONE's property. Thankfully, I've been in contact with the two men who own several of the mines in the Tecopa area. We have been given special permission to explore out there, as we know "people who know people", and they know that we aren't just bumpkins blundering around with a walmart flashlight. We *do* gear up, we ALWAYS wear helmets, we carry hydration packs and food and medical supplies and have a system of notifying people from our base camp area of where we are at each day via a pre-arranged spot where we leave a note and a map. We already know all of the coordinates for the mines we are going to explore, and have mapped out the area ahead of time. (mapped out the mines on land, not the insides of the mines).
We have the numbers for the local FD, SAR, and MR (mine rescue) team on our phones.
There are risks we take, but that's kind of an "understood" part of exploring mineshafts which can be up to 120 years old or so.
Our group was actually invited to take part in a body search in the Ludlow area, out by Calico; a few months ago. I'm in close enough now that I have contacts with a few of the SAR guys. They know that I know my gear and use of it. In that area we were given carte blanche to explore anything we wanted, whether it was gated, barred, or whatever; as long as we could find a way to crawl in.

People still die occasionally searching mines though. It's almost ALWAYS people who don't know what they're doing, and just drive out to them for the fun of it.

Tecopa:
The mines in Tecopa were started in 1875. They ran in 3 different time periods; from 1875 to 1881, the "Osbourne Period". From 1906 to 1928 "Tecopa Consolidated Mining Period" - The second boom. And from 1940 to 1957, Shoshone Mines Inc., Finley Co. & Anaconda Copper Co. - "The Grand Finale".

The area in which the Tecopa mines are situated has the oldest rocks in the Death Valley region. The rocks of the area are called gneiss, and were deposited, then metamorphosed into folded gneiss outcrops near the War Eagle mine, and the lower levels of the Gunsite mine. Rocks of the Noonday Dolomite variety were also deposited. These rocks are of particular importance to the history of the Tecopa Mines because they are the parent rock of which the lead and other metals are found. The Tecopa Mines were excavated in the Noonday Dolomite as the miners chased the metallic veins. Dolomite is formed from limestone (calcium carbonate) that was precipitated from a shallow marine environment. Magnesium replaced the calcium and thereby limestone became dolomite. Exactly how the replacement of calcium by magnesium happened is not understood by chemists or geologists.

Metals in this region include lead, silver, zinc, iron, gold and copper.

Talc, diorite, dolomite, cerussite, galena, limonite, anglesite, fraipontite, Aurichalcite, chalcopyrite, & pyrite ores are present. As well as several others, I think, but those are the main ones.

There's definitely no coal. The environment needed for coal to be produced isn't present in that area. If there were coal there, these mines wouldn't be abandoned, they'd be strip mining the hell out of them even now. Coal is formed as a layer of ...basically vegetation which has been compressed between two other layers and has been injected with geothermal fluids as necessary, to provide the right mix necessary for coal to form. This is a desert region.

Uhh.... I don't think I missed anything, but lemme know if you have any other questions. I've been studying this region for several months now and I've been continually learning more and more about it. I find it quite fascinating.
(All that being said, we regularly explore mines even when we have no clue who owns them, or if they've reverted back to federal land ownership).

sueann

heya mate i knew they weren't coal butthought they were most likely gold, being california. The shaft im in atm is sandstone/mudstone overhead cable bolted with 4-6 metre bolts 2m apart, walls pure black diamond. we're working 5k underground atm if ur interested will take some pics and get the missus to post. The continous miner works 24/7 at the coal face long wall cutting around 20,000 tonne per 24hrs at $250 per tonne retail value.

enjoyed the pics + info. cheers Johno

Therrin

Yes! I'd love some pictures, that'd be great!

Any pics you have actually, would be cool. Even the lifts between levels, what the operation looks like topside, haulage carts, etc... I'm fascinated with currently operating mines as well as abandoned ones.

I do a bit of field prospecting now, and looks like I'm going back to school for Geology.

There is quite a bit of gold mined in this area, but for most underground commercial workings; its not $$ worthwhile to ONLY go after gold, what with all the other large ore deposits which have financial probabilities. So they go after all types of deposits, and then when they find a gold vein, follow it till it runs out.

Therrin

Ahh, here's a better shot of the ladder systems.... and just how bad some of the rungs were. Cheers!

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sueann

mate we dont have levels, just a gentle gradient around 2clicks then branching out to 5 drifts. Each drift runs between 5-11 ks underground. 3 long walls working right now cutting coal, each one churning out 20,000 tonne in 24hr period. 2 drifts under testing still 1 of them should be ready to cut coal in 5 weeks, the other around xmas. Dont have haulage carts its all done on a conveyer, the belt being 2.5m wide works around the clock.

Conveyer.




Conveyer housing.

sueann

Transporter that takes the suckers to coalface to sweat it out for 13hrs. No worries they luv it and luv payday evne more. we have a fleet of 30 of these babies. keeps the grease monkeys busy.

sueann

The walls and roof r sprayed with limestone then reinforced with high tensile rio the walls are coal and helps to stop coal dropping onto the floor which is a serious fire hazard. Walls and floor are high pressure hosed regulary as they need to be kept clean for this reason. each drift is 5.3m x2.8m

sueann

Bolted. This roof is tested each shift as it needs re-spraying with limestone.

sueann

Earth tremor has caused the roof to drop away here dangerous shit and the drift was closed for 6 weeks mangement not happy lol. The coal cutter was on the other side of the fault so out of action for that period. Its up an running now tho. Blokes lost their bonus pissed off about that.







Massive bolting to hold the roof up, tested every shift without fail.

sueann

New drift still under way. had to seal it off last night as found a gas leak and not happy with the amount of water seepage in walls.




Bad bad wall needs respraying, fire hazard.

sueann

dunno if this quick clip of the conveyer heading up to the washery will work sueann is out bush with horse and dogs so no help, i need some shuteye so will just give it a go. Wanted to get some shots of the long wall in action but got tied up with the mess in the new drift and couldnt get down there.

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Therrin

Pics and video looked/worked great! Wow thats alot of material you folks process. Excellent pictures by the way. Couple questions....

What is it that you do specifically? Whats your position?

How do they "test" the roof every shift? What's involved in the testing?

How do you seal gas leaks? Drilling and filling, or overcoat them with some kind of plasticizer or something?

Are there routes cut in with sump pumps to pump off water seepage, or do you try to seal it off? Seems like sealing it could cause hydraulic pressure behind the walls/roof that could cause instability.

I'm planning right now, and consulting with a few pro's about a new mineshaft we're looking to explore in a couple weeks. It has some flooded shafts that my friends have already seen inside. Supposed to be quite large. I haven't wreck dove in a couple years, but this is a little different. Thinking about diving the flooded shafts. I'd take my BW systems 4 gas monitor inside a small pelican case, and test air quality FIRST if I can find a pocket on the other side somewhere, before going off scuba... Even if no pockets, it'd make for some great video with my helmet cam.

sueann

When theres a gas buildup u increase ventilation by opening vent doors where theres no buildup and closing off others where there is. Ventilation is controlled by this method, if theres a methane buildup of 2.5% ratio the drift is evacuated and engineers and deputies get the neat job of regulating the vents to bring levels to acceptable level. If the methane builds up to around 7% it can explode accidents happen but its highly regulated, every engineer and deputy carries a gas detector plus they hang from the roof at intervals. Alarms go off when methane hits 1% so we know to run and fix, this gives us a leeway before its dangerous.

To test the walls and roof we use a clockit which is a clockfaced instrument with a long fine cable hole are drilled and the cable inserted, the clockit tells u whats going on. Same as, every engineer and deputy carry one always. I walk around with about 10kg of equipment hanging off my belt which is nearly as big as weightlifters belt lol. Keeps u fit.

Most drifts have water seepage, we pump around a megalitre of water out per shift, this is recycled for spot fires plus used for dust suppression, high pressure hosing. I know by visuals when the water seepage is not acceptable, I take no chances. We pump and pump, if this doesn’t end up being controllable the shaft will be deemed unworkable but usually we get it under control. Its the gas that is the worry more so than water tho water is not to be taken lightly either.

What do i do. I’m a coalmining engineer, qualifications include frontline management, coalmine deputy 1st class, shotfirer/explosives expert, strata control certified, gas analysis certified, certificate in feasibility studies for coalmines, advanced 1st aid, OH&S legislation certificate, coalmine legislation certificate. I started as an 16yr old fitter apprentice in the workshops, not allowed underground till ur 18. 6th generation coalminer.
I’m the dogwatch engineer with 75 blokes under me.


All this means i have a friggin lot of paperwork lol.

I’m responsible for getting every one of those guys home to their families every morning and intend to make 100% sure that happens always. I’m only responsible for the blokes underground but another 150 or so would be doing their thing pit top, massive workshops,washery, comms, which is communications, theres cams all over the drifts and the guys up in comms keep a check on whats going on as well safety is paramount.

Theres no way in hell i'd ever be doing what you do lol cheers. u got good insurance? what about litigation if things go apeshit? u have to sign waivers?

sueann

Pretty place my husband works at.

Jeff Darby

a suggestion Sueann if I may, set hubby up his own membership...it's like you have a split personality...lol.. I dont think we have a Johnno as yet, he's already made a playmate in therrin...lol.

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Jeff Darby

lol..I have one of those too.. some times I walk into the house with a chair and whip just incase...lol.. Welcome to Treeworld Johno

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Therrin

Ahh, nice to see you've got your own account!

THAT, was funny. And I've no doubt it could be true. SA seems very... capable. Definitely not a passive type, but she's been great to have around here. It's nice to see another spin on things.

You wouldn't do "what I do" being which, treework or exploring abandoned mines? I think the treework is far more dangerous for the most part. Except usually you don't have to go wriggling into tiny holes in sometimes partially collapsed openings several hundreds of feet underground, when you're working on trees. So I'll give ya that much

I'm leaving tomorrow morning for a 5 day backpacking trip up in the Eastern Sierra Nevada mtns. Going to do some gold panning and sluicing at some spots I've picked out up there which are geologically set the right way for where gold could be located. Pretty excited about that. We'll see how it goes.

Therrin

Shotfirer and explosives expert? Excellent.... I've been interested in taking the blaster's course out here and getting a cert/lisc. in that.

What's the typical degree of gassiness of the seams you work, from I to III?

How much does the amount of methane in the air change after blasting?
How do you control methane ignition when explosives are being used?
Do you tend towards using relatively weaker explosives with a high detonation velocity and lower det. temperatures?
From what I figured, P-5 type explosives with the copper short-delay detonators sounds the safest for that type of environment... but I'm not sure how that relates to the different types of blasting that you'd be doing.

How often do you actually have to use blasting in lieu of cutting machinery to extract the ore from the face? Do you use them to undercut/overcut the seams, or how does that process work?

I've been studying up quite a bit on stuff for what I imagined I'd find with the rock used out here, but it seems like having to deal with the methane would really change up the methods used to do things.

Sorry, I'm full of questions.... I *see* things in the mines, see how things were done back then, and I research some of what's being done now, and then try to form in my mind how things go together or how they went from then to now, but the types of mining are different also. Its all very fascinating.

sueann

Ooooohhh! you will all pay! and pay dearly!






In the meantime that sounds like a great trip Ken, take care and have fun!

johno

lol@ u woman

Nah mate ur right, questions are ok, i can give u a general rundown as to get too deep would take pages +.
If there’s methane no blasting not ever and we don’t blast coal anyway. We drill ahead, drain methane and burn it off in methane chambers or send it to a power grid. Which way we go depends on a a few different scenarios, a bit complex for general discussion.
We do shoot stone, if we need to put a belt chamber thru for instance, and mostly use high velocity nitrope granules diesel mixed and detonated, again very complex but thats the drift of it. there’s no methane in stone.

When shooting a new pit, we excavate the alluvials till we hit stone then will blast till we hit coal, then the continous miner will cut the drift, then send in the road header to complete the job of installing the drifts.
Occasionaly we will shoot some coal when needing to branch off thru coal walls, we avoid this if we can and cut through with the continuous miner, but if it needs to be done, drill and drain methane first then use low velocity power gel to get started,then send in the miner.

Some pit are boxed cut, more straight down than ours, but the same method is used, just the gradient is not as sloped or as long as ours, as the coal is closer to the surface.


Sounds simple when put like this but thats the general gist of it.

I meant checking out abandoned mines more so than climbing trees tho I've seen some of the pics here and not to sure about that either, every man to his own i reckon. i've felled a fair few gums around here for recreational purposes + firewood only.

The pics I've seen of some of these old mine shafts look pretty dodgy to me, but seems like u know what ur doing with it. Never seen a gold mine but i do know theyre a lot different to how we do things with coal.
Bit time crunched with needing to head off to work but ur pics are very interesting an look forward to the next lot, ur trip sounds good.

Therrin

Ah, the first one you mentioned sounds like ANFO. Good stuff!

Thanks for the detailed response. As you said, we could fill pages with the details, but I appreciate you putting it across the way you did; it still allowed me to picture in my head the basics of what you were saying. Not simple at all, I can only start to see the complexity of it; but sounds like a tried-and-true system... it'd have to be the way you guys work it over there.
I need to get with a local blaster and discuss some of the finer detail stuff I'm trying to learn about.

I have 6gigs of pics and videos just from this last trip. The pics I put up on this thread are only a tiny sample of what we saw. If you're interested though, here's a link to my other mineshaft exploration page. There are dozens more pictures... all loaded to the page so you can just scroll down through them.

Yes....

Those are the pics from 2 trips. This thread is from my last trip, and I've done a total of about 7 trips just this year so far. Deepest in vertical depth was right around 800' down. Deepest in a single run was around 300' straight down.
Even found a brand new stolen truck, 200' down in the very bottom of a vertical talc mine shaft. The plates were from Nevada, registered in '09. Called it in when I got out, gave them the Liscence # and verified its location. Asked if they wanted to send out a deputy and I'd take him down but they weren't too keen on the idea, said they'd take my word for it. =D

These are some of my fav pics.. out of that bunch.

Boots! This actually wasn't a collapse, it was a mostly backfilled drift that dropped down on the other side and led to more drifts and stopes.


Standing at the bottom of a 190' shaft. Dug our way in under the concrete footing of the grate, rappelled down and then got to the bottom and realized it didn't go anywhere and had to ascend back up.


My friend Matt, who I went on this Return to Tecopa trip with. This portal had been blasted, and we dug out an opening big enough to squeeze into. It was this size for about 8' diagonally then dropped into the drift.

Eric Frei

I watched The Descent Part 2 on DVD last night.

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