#153: HOAES (7)

This past Wednesday, I had the opportunity to go to the Kimballton underground mine in Giles County for one of my mining classes; this mine is overseered by Lhoist North America. It was such a wonderful experience, and also my first time going to an underground mine. The primary production in this mine is limestone. Honestly on my way heading there I had no expectations but just curiousity, so I wouldn't really say it was what I expected or not. I could write all day about it, but I'll just state a few observations/comments for the sake of time, and I need to go to bed soon.

Before heading there, our professor warned us to dress warm since it's an underground mine and the possibility of it being cold is high. Fortunately for my group, it was not very cold so I had no need for my jacket and was content with just a sweater. Also, we were told to bring hard boots if we did not have the proper steel-toe boots, but for some weird reason, I could not find my hard boots that morning; so I decided to wear my uggs and was given a toe shield (I forgot what the technical name is), in order to protect my shoes. Being that its an underground mine, I never thought about the lighting but I was quite amazed by how dark it was in there. Honestly if I was lacking excitement for the tour and sleepy, I could have slept throughout the tour, because it was very dark and cool in there, and the ride was very long; I think our tour guide (Wes) mentioned that the mine is 2300 ft deep, don't quote me on that.

Overall, I had a good time touring the mine and getting to learn a lot. Although I do not have experience as yet in underground or surface mining, I'm looking towards underground right but of course that's a bias preference because that is all I am conversant with at the moment. Something that amazed about the mine though is how after going underground, one completely forgets about time because the difference between day and night cannot be distinguished but time in a way stands still. Like I said, I enjoyed the experience and I think this is because I'm more of a practical person rather than theoretical because to be honest, I am currently not enjoying some of my lectures but I can proudly say that my Rock Mechanics lab is my favorite class because everything is very hands-on, and I am sure you all remember in a few posts ago of how I lamented tirelessly about how much fun I'm having in it.

Rather than saying much, I've posted numerous pictures I took; actually, I did not take as much as I wanted because my camera's picture quality was really poor due to the lighting and such. While browsing the pictures, you will notice that I took a picture of the women's bathroom. This is because I requested to use the bathroom: (1) because I needed to use it, due to the fact that I drink a lot of water, (2) I wanted to know how progressive of a company it was. One of my friends who's an engineer once told me that she interned for a company that none of the men employees knew where the women's bathroom was located and this is because they rarely had women visit and there were no women employees. So in my case, this mine passes my test and I hope they are an equal opportunity establishment, even though I did not see any women miners during the entire tour.

P.S.: Pictures these and many other pictures can be viewed in an album (Kimballton Limestone Mine) on my primary website.