 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
| Field Trip "F"
The Trans-Alaska Pipeline, the Permafrost Tunnel, and Fort Knox gold mine |
Led by:
|
| This trip is designed for people who are ready to hear about something other than forests.
We'll visit the Trans-Alaska Pipeline to the northeast of Fairbanks and hear about the impact of the pipeline on
Alaska's history, economy and environment. Then we'll drive to the U.S. Army's Cold Regions Research and Testing
Laboratory's Permafrost Tunnel. This unique research tunnel was excavated in the 1960s in ice-rich permafrost
adjacent to an area dredged during early placer gold mining. Today this 360-foot-long underground facility is
an active laboratory available for a variety of research programs.
Next we'll visit Fort Knox Gold Mine. The Fort Knox area has been actively explored for gold placer deposits since 1902 when Felix Pedro discovered gold in Fish Creek, located downstream of the Fort Knox deposit. Since that initial discovery, the Fish Creek drainage basin has produced in excess of 8 million ounces of gold, predominantly from placer deposits. Placer mining operations continue to this day. Fort Knox is currently being mined as a conventional truck and shovel open pit mine. Ore is processed at a modern carbon-in-pulp gold extraction mill (the largest in North America), adjacent to the Fort Knox mine. Fort Knox has produced gold on a continuous basis since 1996, producing slightly more than 2.66 million ounces of gold (443,000 ozs annually) from 99.7 million tons of ore (16.6 M tonnes annually). We'll see a video about the mine, and then travel by van to the mine pit, where we'll see some of the largest equipment working extracting ore. We'll continue to the crusher, where a giant mortar and pestle-type machine crushes 5 foot rocks to about 5 inches. Return to the mine administrative building where you will have an opportunity to hold and have your photo taken with a gold bar weighing over 20 pounds. |
| << Back to Field Trips |
Home | About Us | Program | Abstracts | Field Trips | Registration
Accommodations | Optional Tours | Sponsors | Useful Links | Contact Us
Download and Print Essential Conference Information File