About Mining for Opals in Outback Australia, Coober Pedy, Part-3

Here is a shot drilled, loaded and ready for firing, just have to roll up the 3 fuses on the bombs in the roof and I will be ready to light it, before I do I will go up top and start the blower as it is off right now, only run it when I am about to light the shot and then pull the fumes and some of the dirt, here you can see in the face what is called a Ironstone Level, this level is also called a defined level as you can quite clearly where the level is, then there are level that are not so quite defined and are hard to pick up and that is the case with the level above me, some 10 feet up, I am working the bottom level here so the floor is at 80 feet from the surface.

There are 16 bombs in this shot and I have shown you the firing order I use, as all of the fuses are exactly the same length this makes the job easy to have the shot come out as I want it so when I light the fuses I leave about 4 seconds before I light the next one in line, but I always leave about double that when lighting the second fuse to make sure that the first one goes off first and makes a hole in the center as I have no control over the burning rate of the fuse and it may vary from one to the other, but 3 seconds is a long time and do not have many mistakes at all in firing a shot , if I do it is normally something I have done or not done right, does happen now and again.

Here is the result of the shot I fired in the order I showed you, as I have drilled all the holes 4 foot deep except for the center one, that I drill 3 foot deep, this is called the OPENER, you must create a hole in the center that the rest of the bombs will blow into, this is the same procedure in Hard Rock Mining only the Drilling Pattern etc is different, but all need that hole in the center to blow into, then as the next bomb goes off it blows the dirt into this hole it also blows outwards as well, more on that later, then the 3 bomb blows in from the opposite direction, I have then created a big hole and from here it is easy for the rest of the bombs to do there job, as next I light the bottom and all they have to do is blow upwards, then No 6 will blow down as it has nowhere else to go, No's 7 & 8 blow in sideways and down, No's 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 all blow down, leaving the level where it is for me to knock down by hand with the hand pick or electric jack pick.

When I am first starting off a claim and do not have much room underground I have to make sure I have longer fuses on the bombs and after I have lit then I have to come up on the winch and wait for then t go off and then pull the fumes with the blower, off yes I have the pipes down the hole and but have to make sure that the telescope (more on that later on) is level with the roof so it does not get damaged, then after I have pulled the fumes form the blast I can go down and inspect it and then if all is right I will start to clean up the dirt that has got thrown back down the drive then right up to the main shot itself and then I will pull some of the shot itself. (different shot that shown drilled above)

I would then pull about half of the dirt from this shot and then pull some of what is left (a lot) to make the shot flat on top so I could then sit or lie down while I picked the level down by hand, this is the best part of the job as this is where you may get pad for your effort and this Ironstone Level is the best level if you can find one as it is thought that you have a better chance of finding opal in it, not sure if that is the case but it easy to follow that's for sure, here also you can see that I am using black plastic pipes, used to have metal ones when I first bought the blower, but got rid of them when I could afford it.

Had to replace the lot as they were well worn and I was always patching them up by bronzing patches on them so it cost almost $3,000 to replace the whole lot as this pipe is 8 1/4 inches inside diameter and the metal were 9 inches, so that meant I had to have not only the pipes replaced but 5 new elbows made along with 2 telescopes and 260 feet of pipe, plus I had to modify them so I did not have to use clamps to put then together as that is a pain to put together when working by yourself and I had a better idea which works fine, so above you can see one 6 foot pipe I use with a 6 foot telescope and as I work forward pulling dirt I only have to pull this telescope out as I go along until I have to put another pipe, then put this back in front again and continue working, now you know why we call them a telescope.

Here is a photo taken with out the flash, was an accident at the time, but I thought it was a great photo, you can see the dry dirt falling out of the hole like a waterfall, this shot was taken when I was not far into this first claim of mine and I did not have a lot of room to work in, but could stay down while the shot went off, that's right I have to tell you about that, well what happens is that I must have 2 drives going, so what I would do when I had got 4 shots in one drive which is 16 feet, I would start another in a different direction but at a right angle to this one, while I was starting this drive I would also have to come up while the shot went off and pull the fumes, but after I had gone in 2 shots ( 8 foot) I could then stay down for the 3rd, as I would then be able to go down to the rear of this second drive while the shots went off in the other drive.

I had to make sure that the roof in that area was safe and nothing would fall down with the sock waves from the blast and after I had lit the fuses I would go down this drive and press your ears shut to protect them from the noise and I would be safe from any flying debris, the fuse would be 3 foot long and that would give me around 2 minutes before they went off, supposed to be 2 meters long (6 foot - 6 inches) but we do try and save on the cost and I can tell you that 2 minutes is along time to wait (try holding your breath for that time) as most times I would only have about 50 feet or so to go to get out of the way, plenty of time and very safe.

And as I have aid I would have the blower running before I lit the shot and would have a pipe about 15 feet from the face, the blast would send the sandstone back further than this but it would be not en mass just scattered mostly small pieces, which would have been from the first 3 bombs, the main shot would not travel more than about 5 or 6 foot out, so it was a matter of when the shot had gone off, all of them, have to count just in case one did not go off, I would pick my hand light up and go and put it on a nail that I had in the wall at the end of the pipe in the drive then I would pick up 10 foot pipe that I had got ready but back down the drive or around the corner if I did not have to room and go up to the shot holding my breath and put this pipe up on the shot and place it against the pipe on the floor and the fumes would quickly get pulled out of the drive.

Now I know this sounds like a long time the way it is written, but in actual fact from the time the last bomb has gone off to having the fumes out completely out of the drive and me pulling dirt to clean up after it would only take about 2 minutes, just to pull the fumes would only take 1 minute, because they are trapped in a small drive and if we are quick (have to be) they don't get time to spread out from there, that is why it is quick to get rid of them, then below is what I do, I have to brake up any big pieces that are there with the electric jack pick or that pick on the back end of the shovel, this shovel by the way is special made by us, I made this one with the aid of an old and work out pick head.

Then after I have done all of this above and had checked the level and was ready to knock off for the day, when I had got all of equipment ready on the winch for going up, this includes the drill and electric jack pick, never leave any electric equipment underground may get stolen during the night (night-shifters) I would then go and light the bombs in the roof and go up, this is the day after the main shot above as has white Alinite on the top of it which is from the roof, pull this lot the next morning then drill and start all over again.

Again this photo is of my first claim that I have been working by myself at 11 mile, the very first claim that I had with that first partner that I tried with my blower is just to the left of that old car in the background on left of photo, the blower is on a shaft behind the dump to the right, my wife Patricia is now working with me for a while and is getting ready to go downunder for the days shift.

You may think this looks easy, but what my wife is about to do took her 2 years to get round to doing, the first time I asked her if she wanted to go underground she said yes and when we got out to the claim I showed her what to do so she would be safe, remember that I now have this electric winch, I would not have asked nor would I have attempted this with the 4x4 winch and as you will see more clearer below, I made a special rope for her to put round her waist and then over the safety hook so she could not fall down the shaft, at worst if anything happened she would be left suspended from the rope and I could them bring her back up as I have a another switch on the winch up top that I can operate the winch with, I had this put on when I built the winch so when you have a partner or take someone down with you I can bring up the seat, as the person who goes down operates the winch themselves.

Anyway as I said it took Pat 2 years to go under for the first time, she came out one day and I got her to put the hard hat on and after giving her a demonstration on how to get on and off the seat safely etc, I put the safety rope around her and helped her get on the seat and then I connected the rope to the safety hook and she straddled the hole and as you can see I have what I call a square hole for safety on top of the shaft, Pat could not bring herself to take her feet off this timber and suspend herself above a open shaft and I did not blame her, so I did not push it.

I got her back from the center of the hole and back to the side again then took the rope off the hook and then she got off the seat and that was it for the next 2 years give or take, then one day I just said to her going to try and go underground again with me and she said yes, could not believe it as I was only joking at the time, so I took here out again and did the routine all over again and she did it, she actually took her feet of the timber and was suspended over the shaft and that was the hardest part, even for me when I first started, it puts a knot in the stomach, takes some guts to hang suspended over a open 3 meter diameter hole that is 70 feet to the floor, so here she is going down, this was not the first time mind you, Pat is well used to going up and down by the time I took this photo.

Here is Pat at the bottom of the shaft, you can see now the rope that I made for her, the rope is from a long length around 200 feet of it, I found while beach combing in Western Australia along 80 mile beach around 1990 and is from a Fish Trap that got washed in shore after a big Storm, it is very strong rope and as I can do my own splicing, made this the right length from eye to eye for Pat to use, as you can see one eye goes through the other and there is no way she can fall down the shaft if anything was to happen to her on the way down.

The white you see at the bottom of the shaft or roof of the claim is called Alinite, it is a sort of highly compressed talc powder, some of this is soft and some is that hard it rings when you hit it with a pick, cannot remember what this lot was like, but as you can also see Pat looks quite at ease and comfortable on the seat, you can see that we also runs ladders down the shaft for safety, just in case the generator runs of fuel, it shouldn't but sometimes you get carried away with the time down here especially if you are picking in the wall and if you are not watching the clock you can forget the time quite easily.

You can also see the ladders do not quite reach the bottom, there is another 8 foot to the floor from the roof, this is to try and stop the Night Shifters as we call them, that is the guys who go around the fields during the night and check out claims that they think are on opal, and as they may climb your ladders and are in the dark until they get to the bottom its better to leave the bottom ladder of then they do not know how far to the floor and will have to go back up again, this may or may not work but that's what I do anyway and the bottom ladder is at the bottom on the ground and out of the way just in case I will need it.

When Pat started coming with me to work which she did for 6 weeks, would have been longer, but for an accident more on that later, I taught her to make the bombs for me, which is an easy job and used to be my rest time when I was working by myself, as you get to sit down and relax while making them, to make the bombs we roll up a sheet of newspaper around a 2 inch plastic tube, which I do at home and bring them out to the field with me in the morning, making them all the same length and I would roll up about 30 at a time so I always had spare tubes, the bombs have to end up being about 12 inches long and 2 inches in diameter, so when I roll up the paper and take it off the tube there is enough to roll one end in, blocking off that end and making the tube, then Pat has to put a length of Cordex in the tube and then pore the ANFO (stands for Ammonite Nitrate Fuel Oil) in until it is around 2 1/4 inches from the top, then she will bump the tube on a block of wood on the ground a few times, you can just see it between her feet.

This is to pack the Ammonite Nitrate tight in the paper tube and not have any air or space in there and then top it up if needed, then Pat will pinch the top of the tube together and again bump softly it on the wood to again make sure it is still tightly packed while at the same time keeping the paper pinched in tight at the top, then she will put a wire tie around the closing off the bomb leaving around one and a half inches at the end, it is then ready for the next step which she will do when finished making all the bombs that I require for the shot.

As you can see Pat is sat down while doing this job, taking it easy this also grounds the her while she is doing the job so no static electricity can build up and cause a problem as it did in the old days, there was many years ago I have been told some people who got fingers etc blown off through static electricity setting off the detonators, as they used long plastic bags as tubes supplied by the same company (ICI) that supplied the Ammonite Nitrate in those days, turned out this was very dangerous and stupid due to the static electricity that we create, also one of the reasons that we are not allowed to use electric detonators here, I am particularly bad for that, I do create a lot static electricity at times and get a shock when I touch things but it normal affects me at home not at work underground, I cannot remember even getting a static electric shock underground, but there is always a first time for everything.


Where things are always on the Hop		And the wheels are always in Motion