In 2018, Russia mined more than 43 million carats of diamonds, which is almost 30% of world production. For comparison: the second largest producer - Botswana - produced 24.3 million carats.
ALROSA is the world's largest diamond mining company; in 2018 alone, it produced 36.7 million carats. The organization owns 12 mines in distant and sparsely populated Siberia, most of them located in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). This region is 5 times larger than France, but has only 1 million inhabitants. The bulk of the 35, 000 ALROSA employees permanently reside in this part of the country.
I decided to visit one of the diamond mines during a trip to Russia, for this I had to spend 3 days in Yakutia. My goal was to visit the Botuobinsky quarry, which brought 1.4 million carats of rough diamonds in 2018.
Go to the treasures
Mirny is a city with a population of only 40, 000 people. Here is the headquarters of the largest diamond mining company in the world ALROSA. 10 of the 12 mines of this organization are located in Yakutia. To get to the final stop of my journey, I needed to fly some distance on a charter flight from the city of Mirny.
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The plane on which we made our journey had 27 seats, the An-38-100 model. This transport is the property of ALROSA, in addition to it there are planes that operate flights throughout Yakutia, as well as to such cities as Moscow, St. Petersburg, Sochi and Novosibirsk.
I was one of the last to board an aircraft and took the last remaining free space with my back in the direction of travel, to the right behind the cockpit. There was no special place for luggage, and people threw their bags in a pile at the rear of the aircraft, they had to sit anywhere. The back of my chair was arranged on the wall of the cockpit, and all the way I flew with a straight back, which was uncomfortable and tiring. But I had a great view of everyone who was heading for a shift or for other matters to the mine.
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It is interesting that some miners who live near the mine go there every day by bus, and those who work in more remote areas have to fly to work by plane. The benefit of such inconvenience has to endure only 2 weeks, that is how much a change of a miner per month. After 2 weeks of vacation.
In addition to workers, our group included 5 more journalists and 2 guides from ALROSA. Through the dirty glass of an airplane, I watched us fly over forests, dirt roads, rivers and lakes. The first time I flew on such a small plane, I could hear him humming loudly, gaining altitude.
Arrival to nowhere
About an hour later we landed in that place, which can be safely called the middle of the world. There were only many trees around and nothing more. Even the air here was colder than in Mirny. The group went through the smallest airport I have ever seen. He looked like a little white house. Everything happened so quickly that I barely had time to notice a small metal detector and a small waiting area in which the TV modestly huddled. We passed through it on the opposite side, where a bus was already waiting for us. It was 10 minutes drive from the airport to our next stop - the administrative building of ALROSA, not far from the mine.
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The administrative building is equipped so that miners can have a meal there and change into clean clothes. We were given several mining uniforms. According to the rules, we should wear jackets and hard hats before entering the mine. Also, according to company employees, outerwear protects against mosquitoes and other blood-sucking insects that terrorize the region in the summer months.
On the way to the mine
We listened to a five-minute safety briefing, instructed him to obey the accompanying company employee, do not get under the feet of the miners, and stay away from the storage areas for explosives and oxygen cylinders.
After they put us in a huge orange truck, which was supposed to take us to our place. It was very hot to ride in, and it was shaking terribly all the way. Fortunately, our journey took only 10 minutes.
First, we were taken to the observation deck, from where a view of the pit of the Botuobinsky mine opened. It went down a spiral about 130 meters and was about 3.5 kilometers at its widest point. This mine has been in operation for about 5 years and was created with the help of explosives, which saved it from the empty soil at the top. Then used excavators and trucks to pull out the soil and kimberlite ore, which contains diamonds. The Botuobinsky mine will continue to deepen further, it is planned that it will work for about 15 more years. After the quarry is completely processed, ALROSA will turn it into an underground mine and continue to work in the bowels. It took the truck 40 minutes to make the trip to the bottom of the mine and climb back.
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Some of the trucks transport empty soil to the surface and unload it nearby, while others at that time take kimberlite ore to the plant for enrichment (this is the process of separating untreated precious stones from other minerals and soil). About 5 times more earth is excavated than ore, so most of it has to be thrown away. Trucks are capable of transporting more than 90 tons of soil or ore in one run.
Work in the field
I was lucky, managed to jump into one of the trucks, ride next to one of the ALROSA miners. The driver is one of 47 miners who work in the mine around the clock. Some work in a two-week shift for 11 hours a day, others - at night. I was not able to consider the rest of the drivers, but my companion explained that only men were hired. Female drivers drive passenger trucks for workers. But several women have already begun to train in ore transporting machines. After me, they drove closer to look at the excavator, which dumps the earth and ore into the cargo compartment.
About 30 tons of cargo are visited in one bucket of an excavator, 3 full buckets are placed in one truck. About 60, 000 tons of soil and ore are extracted from the Botuobinsk mine during the day.
Neighbors
Botuobinskaya is not the only mine in the district. A short drive from the hotel is the Nyurba open pit, with a depth of about 360 meters. Due to its depth, she looked very impressive. But the prospect of driving along its narrow roads was a bit scary, so I decided to just look at the field from the side.
At the end of our tour of the diamond deposit, we were able to take a closer look at some types of kimberlite ore, igneous rocks that may contain diamonds. Unfortunately, no diamonds were found in my handful of ore.
