Discover the world’s largest diamond mine
Mirnyj diamond mine, Russia, after half a century of mining, has turned into a huge vortex-shaped cave-like hole deep into the ground, viewed from above the surface of the pit, it feels like this area has been shaken before. by earthquake, the crater diameter is about 1,200m, the depth is about 525m. If an excavator car traveling at 60 km/h travels along the spiral path of the inner wall of the hole, goes to the bottom of the hole, and then returns to the ground, it takes nearly 2 hours.
Adding to the intrigue of the location, the town is built on stilts because the ground is covered with a thick layer of permafrost for at least seven months of the year.
Diamond mining in Mirnyj dates back 50 years. In 1955, a young Russian geographer went to survey Siberia, and when he came here, he accidentally discovered that this area was hiding rich diamond resources. Later, the geographer’s discovery became a top secret Soviet state program.
The Soviet government at that time spent a large amount of money on diamond mining. Up to the 90s of the last century, in this area of mines contributed to the world 23% of the total diamond production.
In 1957, Stalin ordered the construction of the Mirny diamond mine, but the terrain and inclement weather made things difficult. In winter, Mirny’s temperature is 40 degrees below zero. It’s so cold that car tires burst and the oil freezes.
The state is forced to use jet engines to melt ground ice and dynamite to overcome the permafrost to be able to build mines. All of this proved to be worth it even though in 1960 the mine was up and running and offered a lot of bounties.
During the mine’s first decade of operation, it produced 10,000,000 carats of diamonds a year, 20% of which were gem quality. An even bigger find was when it produced a fancy lime-yellow diamond of 342.57 carats, the largest diamond ever found in the country.
According to When On Earth, with a depth of 540 m and a diameter of nearly 1.6 km, the pit near the town of Mirny in eastern Siberia looks like it was hit by a meteorite. Mir diamond mine has a value of 17 billion USD, including the number of diamonds that have been extracted from the mine plus the remaining reserves.
Due to the depth of the spiral pit, the magnetic fields inside the ground and the air above the ground surface form a high-speed moving air stream. If a small, lightweight aircraft flew through the air in this area, it could be sucked into the pit by the mobile airflow!
The Mir diamond mine was closed in the 2000s. But mining continues through dozens of deep tunnels. It still carries an impressive output, about 2 tons of diamonds per year.
Source: Synthesis
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