Mining Part Two

The mine is now filled with water

Not all iron mines were underground like Soudan was. After touring Soudan, my family and I went to Mineview in the Sky, a overlook of what used to be a surface mine in the Mesabi area. In a surface mine, all the mining is done on the surface, without digging mining shafts into the earth.

The iron mined in Mesabi is in a soft type of ore called taconite. Taconite is not nearly as good as the ore at Soudan, and has only a 29% iron content. The iron part of taconite is concentrated into pellets before it's shipped from Duluth and across the Great Lakes to factories.

Taconite is still mined today, and the Mineview in the Sky will be dug up soon to mine more iron.

Me on the huge mining equipment