November 30, 2003 Opal Mining Update - No 26 Things that can happen in one Issue.

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Took the truck in for the repairs to the exhaust muffler, was going to put it off until tomorrow as I have to have that off as well, things to do around town etc, but the noise was that bad with a straight exhaust pipe and as I has to go through town to get fuel for the truck and generator, I decided it was not worth it so took in as today as planned. Had a day off as planned, but it rained in the afternoon at last as it had looked menacing all day and so finally let go with a downpour, here it is just before the storm hit.

Here the storm has just hit us, wont take long to flood the yard again.

This is just within 3 or 4 minutes of it starting.

And here we are another 4 minutes later, not as bad as the storm we had last year, it was really flooded, in just under 20 minutes we had a lake here.

We don't have much cover here to put things under, would be nice if I could afford to extend the veranda a bit to keep the vehicle out of the weather, the sun is the worst as in the long run it ruins the paint work.

Last night was the worst, it not only rained some more but we had a real Thunderstorm, Pat was telling me that where she works at the Mud Hut Motel, Katherine one of the Manageress there her little boy was sick and I mean he threw up, the noise was that bad from the thunder and I was also talking to a Greek friend of mine today in the pub and he said that he had never heard anything like that before. And he has been mining here for over 26 years, so with all that water lying around I did not go onto the field today and the forecast over the next couple of days is for more rain and storms, which I hope they are wrong, if it does not rain between now and the morning I will go out to the opal field and see if everything is alright on the claim and if possible do some work, will only be pulling dirt, but has to be done before I can do another shot. Went out to the opal field as I had to see if I could get out to the claim, if not I would have come back and gone out in the 4x4 with a shovel just in case I had to make a repair around the shafts, but all was well, it had rained a lot out there when that Thunderstorm hit and had dumped a lot of water but it was already starting to dry up, as you can see below.

What really annoys me is that some Miners cannot even wait one day after a storm like we had, they still have to go out and cut the roads up, I have even seen a couple get bogged a few years ago, serves them right, but they still have bother somebody to get them out when that happens, the track to my blower and claim is just the other side of this water.

Here you can see that the water has run down and around the shafts, but only because I put the dirt around the shafts, if not it would have run down the a shaft again.

This close up shows you how the water has cut a track, looks like a little river bed, you can see that if the dirt had not been there it would have run straight down the shaft that the ladders are down, there was not as much water this time as the storm dropped when we were on holidays in February and March and for that I am thankful.

Here you can see how the water has run down the pipes and the clamp is full of fine mud, there is nothing we can do about this, just take the clamp off and clean up a bit.

Here the water that has rained straight down the 3rd shaft, there was no water on the floor, so not a lot has got down which is good for me.

Here is the drive now I have pulled the shot again and I am now ready to drill another tomorrow, the level here is not very strong in the middle at the moment, will be interesting to see how it is after the next shot and the level has leveled out as predicted.

Here on the right side of the photo you can see that the level is straight and not on the rise and in the corner it has dropped, I found some colored trace in here and some of it was a very nice green blue crystal, which I will take a photo of tomorrow for you.

Here where the level has dropped and I hope that it keeps dropping for at least another 2 shots as it may make a pocket for me, I was lucky as the bomb was just under the level here I did not know that the level was on the way down, this is one of the problems we face here when we drill, if the level dips like this and it has made a pocket of opal there is a chance if the bomb is to close that it may blow the opal up and leave what we call sugar, because that is what it looks like when you see it.

Here is the next shot and I have drilled a couple of extra shot holes to go under the trace that is on the left, you never know there may be a pocket in there and just in case the level keeps dropping I have drilled on a slight downward angle, don't want to blow any opal do we, also have drilled the top row of holes a bit lower under the level just is case it starts to drop down.

Here is a close up of the level now I have drilled the shot holes, you can see it is in two different places here, as I am still near the fault that I have just gone past, this may still have some affect on it so until I have fired this shot and pulled the dirt I will not know any more about it if any at all, because as I said before it is only a short distance between this last fault and the next one, about 30 feet so the ground may not have time to settle down properly, wont know until I have put in a drive for the whole distance.

This is the green blue that I have found over the last 3 shots or so, bits of trace that I find here and there, never know what I have until I bring the bag home and tumble it.

I know this looks big but most of it is small and thin, but good for some doublets and really good for inlay work, this is really good quality Green/Blue opal, here there is 1.5 ounces, when I am checking the level after a shot and I see a bit of color all I do is just dig it out or pick it up and put it in the bag, so after a 2 or 3 shots you never know what you have, unless I find a pocket of seam opal or perhaps a vertical, then I have some idea of what is going into the bag.

If any of you Subscribers are interested in this little Parcel of Opal above, please let me know and I will get back to with a price, which I have not got as yet, the man who prices my opal has just got back from Greece last week, you have until next weekend to inquire. Did not find any opal or color in the shot and that trace on the left went in a little way and then just disappeared, no trace was found on the left or in the middle and the 2 bombs in the roof did not do there job again so most of it is still up there and I will have to use at least one more bomb to get it down. But again there is some gypsum come in the roof, on both sides as far as I can see, t here is also some Alanite (the white stuff) up there but I knew that because I drilled into it, you can the white powder on the left side of the floor in the photo of the drive just above but I drilled just above the gypsum again, I saw some very thin gypsum on the right side in the roof but this has gone thicker and the 1st bomb was right on top of it, so this stopped the explosive doing it job again. And to top it off the day was a waste of time again as it was one of those days when the blower was nothing but trouble, blockages one after the other and all but one was up top, I went up three times but today was very overcast the temp was down and the wind was blowing strong, so for me to go up top and mess around with the pipes finding out where the blockage was and banging then around a long lump of wood after being underground and wet with sweat is not the thing to do, even though I wear a jumper, so I quit, I opened the bottom elbow before I came up and then opened the top elbow top and came home, always next week, so why push it, not worth it for me, but I am disappointed as I like to do my days work that I go out there for and I don't think that I pulled a quarter of the shot today.

Pulled the rest of the last shot with very little trouble, always have a couple of blockages but got rid of them very quickly and they were down in the bottom elbow which makes it a lot easier and quicker for me to clear. The roof was not as bad as first thought, hard to tell until I pull most of the dirt away from the face, it had blown down over 3/4 of it and the rest was loose enough for me to jackpick down except for this left corner, hard as a rock and interwoven with gypsum, even the sandstone has some gypsum running through it which has given it extra strength. As you can see below the ironstone level (brown lines) is running everywhere, some of it is down and some is on the up, not sure what is going on right now, but there is no trace in here at all as yet, so will just continue to keep driving straight ahead for a while.

This is where I put the extra 2 shots on the right hand side of the drive under where that nice green trace was, but it was a waste of time as there was nothing else in there, pity I like that kind of opal, but even here you can see the level is all over the place.

I had to put a small in that corner of the roof where it did not get blown down and was to strong for me to jackpick, this I did at the same time I fired the next shot, so it did not cost me any time , but I decided this time I would drill the roof after I had pulled the dirt from the shot so I could get a good look at what was up there. Below you can there is plenty of gypsum, but there is more than shows up here in the photo, as this stuff is not just in a line, thick or thin which is a lot easier to deal with, as you can see it and know where to drill to get it down, but this stuff is interwoven through the alanite and sandstone, with some thick and thin pieces here and there which makes the roof very strong in places and if I drill just a couple of inches to high the bombs will not do there job and bring it down.

This shows you what the drive looks like now from about 20 feet out from the face, you can see the ironstone level is all over the place, don't think that it is going to settle down into one line between these 2 faults, not on this angle anyway, it may settle down as it falls away to the left and hopefully will produce some opal, the next shot puts me in the middle between the 2 faults and this is where I will drill a shaft next year.

Drilled and fired 11 bombs, pulled the fumes and cleaned up a bit, the shot came out well then I got ready to check the level, sorry to say it is still all over the place and there was a bit of thin potch on the right hand side of the shot, but that was all, the level still falling to the left which is good, so there is still a chance of finding opal somewhere to the left, did not pull all of the level down, this is defiantly where I will drill a shaft, after I have gone as far as I can in this drive I will open it up more here making it into a small ballroom. Then I will get the shaft drilled, as we say to connect, (meaning we are going to connect to a drive) if I get the direction right (with the compass underground) as the distance is no problem, the shaft should be drilled and break through the roof exactly where I want it, if I am off a bit I will have to open up a bit more to compensate, then I will be able to drive a straight line parallel to the faults and right down the middle, hopefully this might produce some opal. Pulled all of the shot again with some problems with blockages, I hate this damp ground, but it will get harder and slower for me the further I get from the down pipes, this results in using more diesel and time, I am out 41 foot out from the shaft with the down pipes in it, so if I can do another 3 shots I will be happy and I may quit this drive for now unless I have some colored trace in front of me, this drive will be continued when the blower gets put on this new shaft sometime late next year I should think. Below is the results of blowing the roof down, still make quite  pile of dirt to move, basically this is all Alanite (white stuff) which is good for me in as much this will help to clean the inside of the pipes, this is all dry stuff and highly abrasive, in fact when working with this all the time, this is the stuff that wears out the fan the quickest.

As I was drilling the holes in the roof, the drill jammed in the first one I was drilling, the auger was in about 2.5 feet and must have struck a piece of gypsum, in doing so the auger come to a complete stop and twisted in my hands which threw off the left hand twisted my right wrist, I always drill expecting this to happen and of course have a very firm grip on the drill, (hand miners develop strong wrists because of the drill and pick) But when it does happen it still can catch you by surprise, this only causes injury like this when the drilling is easy, as the drill is turning at full speed and the sudden stop causes the drill to twist along with your hands, if the ground was hard the drill would be turning a lot slower and this does not happen, I will pull this dirt tomorrow if I get to work, depends on how my wrist feels in the morning. Below I had to put 3 bombs in the roof because of the gypsum I saw and also because I as I had not taken all of the level down, therefore making it to thick for the 2 bombs in there normal position to do there job, you see that the level has not changed at all.

Here you can see a small pile of dirt that is from me unblocking the pipes up top, when I know that the dirt is stuck up top, I undo the bottom clamp you can see here and hold the telescope to the side (towards the seat) and let the revs on the engine and pull the rope that operates the butterfly valve up top that cuts the air and vacuum off.

Most times this is enough for the dirt that is stuck up in the top pipe, that is the pipe that goes from the yellow hopper below down to the elbow and the pipes that go underground, as there is no suction holding the lumps of dirt in place, most times the dirt will slide backwards down the pipes and sometimes it stays stuck, when this happens I have to come up-top and undo the top clamp and see just where the dirt is stuck and then with a long piece of wood bang away until I get it free, pain in the butt, but that we what we get for working in damp ground, it does not slide like dry dirt, lucky its only damp here.

The wrist did give some pain when I got home yesterday it would seem that I have sprained it a bit, it was also causing me some pain during the night, it is only when I try to turn the back of the hand upwards as that is the direction the drill twisted my hand in, all of the other directions are all right, so we will see how it is tomorrow, I could pull dirt with it, but don't think I could drill again with it as it is without some pain, so will let it get better and not aggravate it any more, not that I have opal in the wall so there is no rush. Friday, Wrist is still not 100% right, the hand was a little bit swollen this morning so will stay at home again and rest it as much as I can.   Saturday, Hand not swollen this morning and wrist is feeling somewhat better, but as the week is all but over today may as well have the rest of the week off and than it will be ready for next week, I am sure you all understand that with age the aches and pains take a bit longer to go away, but I will be fighting fit on Monday. Again I Hope you have enjoyed this issue and look forward to the next one, hopefully I will have some more good photos to show you in the next issue and maybe some of Good Looking Opal and lots of it, I am still hoping that this will be a good year for us in mining, so stay with us over the next few months and find out what goes on in our part of the world as far as Opal Mining goes. Stay Tuned for the next Issue, who knows what I will have to report. Until the next issue......... and wish me lots of LUCK. Cya Later, Stuart Bird. To return back to the Archived Page for more Updates click, Here!

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