A rescue effort continues underground at the Macassa gold mine just west of Kirkland Lake, Ont., where two miners remain trapped following rockburst activity.
The two men, identified in news reports as Robert Sheldon and Leonce Verrier, were working a stope more than a mile below surface on the morning of Nov. 26 when two rockbursts occurred within seconds of each other. The rescue program involves drilling a raise bore hole through a bypass drift, then creating a subdrift into the footwall area where the miners are believed to be trapped.
“If everything goes well, we should be into the stope early next week (the week beginning Dec. 19),” spokesman Al Fong said in a telephone interview from Kirkland Lake.
The next step in the rescue operation would involve removal of rock material and recovery of the bodies.
Mining operations at Macassa have been suspended pending completion of the rescue effort and an investigation into the incident.
Macassa, in production since 1933, has a history of rockbursts, which are stress-related, naturally occurring rock phenomena. Mining can affect the underground stress field, and if the strength of the rock is exceeded by the stress load, a rockburst — a sudden and violent failure of rock — can occur.
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