The Chuquicamata mine, located in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile, is the second-deepest open-pit mine globally, behind Bingham Canyon in Utah. The terrain has been hollowed down by the extraction of massive copper reserves; the greatest hole at the location is about 1,000 meters (3,300 ft) deep. Although there is evidence of mining in this area dating back to the sixth century C.E., modern mining only really started in the 1910s. Over the last few years, activities have shifted underground and there has been less extraction from open pits.
The mining benches in the pits resemble terraces; they hold up machinery and collect debris from debris flows. Beside them are piles of waste rock with low amounts of metals that can be mined. Tailings ponds, located further away, are used to store leftover material from the ore enrichment process.
For ages, people seeking their luck in the porphyry copper deposit found at Chuquicamata. This deposit is the result of heated fluids flowing through igneous rocks. At the mining site, a well-preserved muumy was discovered in 1899. The man, who passed away in about 550 C.E., was thought to have been a miner.
New ore-processing methods and funding from the Guggenheim family’s Chile Exploration Company helped modern mining operations get underway in 1915. Over the next few decades, waste rock piles spread outward and the open pits became deeper, larger, and more numerous. Chuquicamata was first settled as a camp close to the mining operations, and the town’s inhabitants’ health and safety were in danger due to dust, gases, and other mining byproducts. Residents started moving to Calama, a city approximately 15 km to the south (not visible), starting in 2004. By 2007, the community had been fully abandoned.
Chuquicamata started underground mining in 2019 as part of a multibillion-dollar operational revamp. According to the mining corporation, the endeavour is expected to extend the site’s useful life by at least 40 years and tries to reach further reserves amid falling output.
Chile is the world’s leading producer of copper thanks in part to production at the Chuquicamata mine. In 2021, Chile’s output made approximately 27% of the world supply.
This image, taken on January 4, 2024, with Landsat 9 by the OLI-2 (Operational Land Imager-2) shows the traces left by mining activities.
