JeepAndrew’s Abandoned Mines Thread

@JeepAndrew- Glad to see you are exploring mines with obvious care for your safety and for protecting mine cultural significance by not publishing their locations! I’ve worked under contract to do bio surveys for bats in Death Valley and various eastern Mojave mines before where people and even their pet dogs have perished due to human stupidity. Thank you for your excellent warning introduction in this thread, people will certainly benefit for it.

 

Thank you! I definitely appreciate the kind words. I can’t emphasize the dangers enough when it comes to gong into these places. That sounds like interesting work! I’m sure you’ve seen similar places and relics as what I have posted here.

 

Boo on your carefuleness I want Indiana Jones!

I’m happy you’re caring for your safety and I’m stoked you’re documenting your finds. Keep up the good work!

 

I will admit, I’ve done some Indiana Jones-ish stuff before! We can be quite daring when we’re determined to get somewhere underground. But safety is definitely at the top of our priorities. What good would being daring do if I didn’t make it out to the surface to share these awesome pics?

 

Incredible.
Thanks for the window into these places. Stay safe and enjoy. I'll watch from out here.

 

Damn @JeepAndrew , for repelling over a 2600 ft hole.......Not for me

That copper is cool.

 

I'm always amazed at how little support the hanging walls need in these mines.

 

It amazes me as well. This deposit was in Limestone and was very stable.

 

The “Cathedral Mine” continued..

More ladders and stopes. This place just goes on forever..

On and on downward..

Finally to the 400 level, and our first ore car!

Nearby, a bin from another ore car discarded on the side of the stope.

This was some carbide graffiti at a major crosscut junction on the 400. Each of the black dots counted a single car load of ore hauled out of this crosscut from the stopes above. This was a very common method of keeping tally on production.

And downward we continue. 450 feet from our start far above and still descending.


In the 450 level, a small intermediate level for haulage, we find an intact ore car axle.

Nearby, more discarded axles.


And what would you do with an old axle? Make yourself a makeshift miner’s Segway of course!


More discarded wheels on the 450. Seemed like this level was an equipment dump during the mine’s operation.

More 450 level relics, ore car bin up side down in a drift

Clogged and collapsing ore chute.


And yet another ore car! This one was partially dismantled, probably for spare parts.

Making our way through the stopes again, and they’re getting much bigger! This is the best pic I could get of the massive 500 level stope. That stack of timber supports is 150 feet above me! The ceiling was around 400 feet over my head here.

More massive timber cribbing and square sets in the main stope.

Two stacks of timber cribbing that once stretched to the ceiling, but have long since collapsed.


Definitely wouldn’t want to cross that ladder up there without being tied off..

Square set timbering!

 

@snowtank told us about this thread on the weekend. I've just spent almost an hour reading through all this....instead of driving and picking up freight! It's is absolutely fascinating that so much of these mines are relatively undisturbed and intact. Thank you @JeepAndrew for sharing your experiences with us all. Please continue and stay safe brother.

 

DUDE! Absolutely amazing! I am a mine and cave freak from growing up next to Roslyn, WA (absolutely huge coal mining area) and Liberty, WA (gold). I used to go into the museum and spend hours looking over the old mine maps dreaming of the stories my uncle told me about exploring them as a kid. Now a days even if you could find an entrance they're probably all filled with water. There's only two original exposed entrances (both at Swiftwater winery), but it's always been my dream to make my way in one somehow. You should look up Roslyn, it's got some seriously amazing history.

One of the reason's I'm so obsessed with the Southwest is all the mining operations that took place down there. I've never had the opportunity to repel into a mine. So so cool man! Keep this thread up. Literally any of these would be on my bucket list. I've been in two mines in Moab, but that's the extent of my Southwest mine exploration. Not gonna lie, the whole uranium thing and the gas smell freaked me out. What are your thoughts on Uranium mines?

 

I’m glad you’re enjoying the thread! For me, uranium mines are on a special list along with coal mines. Compared to hard rock mines, like gold, silver or copper, these two have their own unique set of hazards, along with the usual dangers (falling rocks, unseen holes etc). Uranium mines are notorious for Radon gas, which is a gas generated by radioactive decay of the uranium. Almost all uranium mines have this gas, to what extent depends on how much uranium is left over. It’s nasty stuff and you definitely don’t want to be in an area contaminated with it.

I’ve only been in a handful of uranium mines, all of which were in Moab, in fact! We had a cheap Geiger counter with us that was screaming the whole time. We didn’t spend too much time in there, due to the sure presence of Radon. That was our primary concern, as the radiation we were detecting wasn’t too much more than x-ray levels.

 

Good stuff!
Keep it coming!

Sub’d

 

Dang! Lol dude this is literally getting me so giddy I wanna go exploring now!!

 

More from the “Cathedral Mine”..

Copper carbonate ores; malachite and azurite

Malachite deposit below some hand-held drill steels left in place by the miners!

Miah slides down a pile of loose rock in the main stope. This was the gigantic underground space I mentioned. The far wall is 500 feet ahead in the dark background...

More squareset in the main stope, with collapsed sets below.

Some very interesting miners graffiti of a man holding a child.

More graffiti








Finally to the 500 level! Interesting modern graffiti..

Main shaft station on the 500, with a large compressed air tank. The timbers enclose a ladder way that was built between the 500 and 600 levels in the 1990s. Unfortunately it was very unstable and not descendable, so we were unable to climb lower.


Pretty shoddy..


The massive ore bin on the 550 level haulage tunnel, which extends to the surface more than 1500 feet away. It’s seen better days for sure.

 

So a bunch of you have expressed interest in the equipment left behind, so let’s shift gears a little bit, and take a look at some of the awesome surface equipment I encountered while in Utah.

*NOTE* If you happen to recognize any of these surfaces sites, PLEASE keep the location name(s) to yourselves, and DO NOT ATTEMPT TO TRESPASS!! This was a request from the property owner himself. Keep in mind that we had expressed permission to be on these sites.

Two extremely old and rusty Mancha Electric Trammers, similar to the more pristine one I posted a pic of myself sitting on before. These battery-powered units would push ore cars and equipment cars through the mines.

Manufacturer’s tag on one of the trammers.


Michael, the property owner’s geologist, standing over a pristine flat car outside of an adit. These were often used in conjunction with the trammers to haul timber and equipment in and out of the mine.

One of the many 75+ year old buildings and structures on the property. Most of these were fully restored and stabilized!!

Small house..

Adit portal sandwiched between a generator house and machine shop. Notice the tracks still in place leading out.

What was once the assay house (I think). This building would be where ore samples from the mine were tested for metal values.

Oooohhh what have we here?? These buildings were very old and mostly untouched.


Turns out this is a combined machine shop, compressor house and hoist house for a nearby mine.

We decided to check out the basement thru the open delivery ramp first. Look at all that old equipment!

Various pieces of drilling equipment. You can see a pile of long drill steels in the lower right of the pic.

Drills, drills, and more drills! Amazing.

Heading up into the machine shop. Ignore the modern halogen flood lamp at center, a cleaning crew left it there sometime before.

Old vise still attached to a work bench..

Smaller hand-held pneumatic hammer, probably turned in for repair 70 years ago and left on the bench when the mine closed, never repaired..

Now THAT’S a lathe! Almost 15 feet long!

Looking towards the compressor bays, you can see the huge motor and flywheel for the compressors.

Another shot towards the compressor bays..

One of two of the massive two-cylinder Ingersol-Rand air compressors, this unit was much older than it’s brother, and had a massive electric induction motor direct-drive to the flywheel and crankshaft.

Just one of the cylinders. Mind you, I’m standing upright while taking this pic...

 

Great thread thanks for sharing,

Do you do this as a profession? During off roading, Or are you a google master. Curious how you are able to find these without giving away your secret. I read your disclaimer and agree whole heartedly. But I am curious how you got the skill set.

 

I need to look for some pics online. I got to go to the machine shop at the company my dad worked for. They had a full shop for their standalone crusher maintenance crew near Atlanta.

Rows and rows of big lathes. Huge huge huge freaking mill out back. 20'+ tall.

Each region seemed to have something special that was started 30-40-50 years ago. Would be really tough to have the capital to start it now, even as the largest construction aggregates company in the country.

 

This is actually a side-hobby, along with metal fabrication and Jeeps (I do have a 2nd gen by the way). 15 years so far exploring. My uncle was in the mining industry and got me into it just out of high school. It often goes hand-in-hand with off-roading, as that’s usually required to get to these places. The skill-set came partly from personal experience and skills passed on from my uncle.

A few years back, I got away from doing the “freelance” part of mine exploring and managed to get in with a multi-state exploring group. About that time I delved into vertical rope access, and began seeing these really killer sites, like the ones posted here. The group I’m part of, as well as others, go to great efforts not to reveal names or locations online or to unknown or non-trusted individuals. The states and federal government are on a witch hunt to close up these places, in the name of public safety, and we’re trying to make efforts to delay those closures as long as possible (by not openly revealing site names) in order to document as much of this history as we can before it A- collapses and is gone forever, or B- is sealed up.

 

Would that happen to be Atlanta, NV?