Cigar Lake Flooding Worsens
Tuesday, October 24, 2006 at 14:20
Even though the entire underground portion of the Cigar Lake project is filled with water, Cameco officials remain confident the uranium mine will one day be operational.
However, the targeted startup date has been pushed back indefinitely by the flooding disaster that’s taken place there over the last couple of days.
The trouble started Sunday afternoon when a rock fall triggered a massive inflow of water in the future production area of the mine.
At first, company officials thought the water had been confined to 40 per cent of the infrastructure below surface.
But a bulkhead door designed to hold back the water didn’t seal properly, which prevented any chance that water pumps could keep up with the inflow of water.
The 26 workers working underground at the time were evacuated safely, and Cameco says no damage has been done to the environment.
Before the failure of the bulkhead door, company officials said the flooding would delay production startup at the mine to early 2009, at the earliest.
But Cameco spokesman Lyle Krahn says it’s safe to say it will be well beyond that before the mine is up and running. Still, Krahn says Cameco isn’t about to give up on one of its prized assets.
The Cigar Lake project is situated on the second-richest uranium deposit in the world, behind only McArthur River.
Cigar Lake has a workforce of 650 people, and Krahn says it’s a bit early to say what will happen to them. But he expects most of them will either continue construction, assist in the remediation plans or be transferred to other mine sites.