John Ross

John (“Jack”) Ross, one of Canada’s most prominent mining engineers, died this past summer. He was 86.

Ross spent 65 years in mining, beginning as a student at the University of British Columbia in the 1930s. He financed his education by working at the Britannia mine, near Howe Sound, B.C. He later sold mining machinery for Ingersoll-Rand, and went on to supervise road construction linking the province’s inland mines with main supply routes. In 1947, he joined Granby Mining Co. as an underground shift boss, and, about a decade later, became general manager.

In 1958, Ross launched his own mining consulting firm, known as J.A.C. Ross & Associates.

As a consultant, Ross recommended the use of tungsten-carbide drill bits and heavy machinery at the low-grade open-pit mine at Copper Mountain. He recommended similar approaches at the Buttle Lake properties, on Vancouver Island, and at the Whitehorse copper mine, in the Yukon. He is probably best-known for developing the Highland Valley Copper mine, near Kamloops, which remains profitable to this day.

Ross was a member of the Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum (CIM), the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada, the American Institute of Mining, Metallurgical & Petroleum Engineers, and the Association of Professional Engineers of British Columbia.

He is survived by his wife, Marjorie, and four children.