Aerial view of the Red Chris pits mine from 2017.Garth Lenz/The Globe and Mail
Three workers are trapped more than 500 metres underground in a northern B.C. mine after multiple collapses blocked an access route.
The first ground collapse at Red Chris gold and copper mine – located near Dease Lake, close to the Alaska-British Columbia border – happened on Tuesday morning and forced the miners to escape to a designated refuge station.
A subsequent collapse blocked the access route and cut off communication.
The mine’s majority owner, Colorado-based Newmont Corp., described the incident in an unsigned statement Wednesday. It said the mine’s refuge station has supplies of food, water and ventilation.
Nolan Paquette, a business agent for United Steelworkers Local 1-1937, told The Globe and Mail the workers are not union members but are contractors and are safely in the refuge station underground.
Two of the trapped miners are from B.C. and one is from Ontario, Premier David Eby said at an unrelated news conference Wednesday morning.
Mr. Eby said the province was in contact with the mine’s owner, which was working with world-leading mining rescue experts.
The mine has paused operations and is assembling a specialist team from nearby mines to respond, the company statement said.
“Our priority remains on ensuring the safety of the three individuals and of the emergency response teams supporting this effort.”
Mr. Eby told reporters later that he didn’t have details on how long the rescue was expected to take.
The Premier said he had spoken to Ontario Premier Doug Ford about the situation and was keeping his government up to date.
“Obviously it’s very concerning for the families, for the workers in the sector and British Columbians and Canadians and our thoughts are with the families and appreciation with the incredibly brave rescue teams that are working right now.”
The province’s ambulance service said it was monitoring the situation.
B.C. has dispatched a geotechnical inspector to support the rescue efforts and approved a permit to move heavy equipment from the nearby Brucejack mine, said a statement from Jagrup Brar, B.C.’s Minister of Mining and Critical Minerals.
The Red Chris mine was seeking to transition from open-pit to underground mining in a bid to unlock 80,000 more tonnes of copper a year. The underground mine would use a block cave underground mining technique. This involves undercutting the core, causing it to fracture and collapse under its own weight, thereby opening access to deeper deposits.
The switch from open pit to underground mining would increase Canada’s copper production by 15 per cent, according to Newmont. The expansion was one of 18 resource projects fast-tracked by the province in February to combat U.S. trade uncertainty.
Feasibility studies are under way at the site, as is some underground development work that will support the expansion project, according to a February production update.
Newmont holds a 70-per-cent stake in the open-pit mine. The remaining stake is controlled by Imperial Metals Corp.
In December, Imperial Metals was slapped with 15 charges for violating the federal Fisheries Act in a tailings-pond spill one decade earlier. The Mount Polley copper and gold mine disaster polluted local waterways with 25 million cubic metres of wastewater which included arsenic, lead and copper.
With a report from The Canadian Press