Torrential rains buffeted northern Chile for the second time this year, causing deadly mudslides and halting work at some of the world’s biggest copper mines, including Codelco’s Chuquicamata.
Storms that struck Arica, Parinacota and Los Rios — in a region famed for being one of the driest places on earth — left at least three people dead, according to government emergency service ONEMI. Hundreds took refuge in shelters, thousands of people lost power and a state of emergency was declared in Tocopilla, where mudslides choked roads.
An El Nino weather pattern is helping end a seven-year drought across the center of Chile, with warmer waters down the coastal Pacific bringing rains. In March, the worst storms in decades cut roads and flooded towns in the north.
For Codelco, the world’s biggest copper-mining company, the weather interruptions are adding to a more than two-week protest by contract workers who have taken over its Salvador mine operation.
Codelco evacuated workers from Chuquicamata at about 3pm on Sunday, while its Rodomiro Tomic operation was suspended temporarily because of poor visibility and dangerous conditions for trucks, the state-owned company said. At Gabriela Mistral, Codelco planned to transport workers to the town of Calama as conditions were forecast to worsen.
Other mines in Chile continued operating. Processing plants at Ministro Hales were running, while Hales’ mining work is still being restricted by the contractor protests. Collahuasi in the Andes Mountains was running under normal winter safeguards, a company official said.
BHP Billiton, the world’s biggest mining company, experienced minimal disruption to operations at its giant Escondida mine, the Melbourne-based producer said.
Operations also continued at Pan Pacific Copper’s Caserones mine, according to a Tokyo-based spokesman for Pan Pacific’s majority owner, JX Nippon Mining & Metals, who declined to be identified due to company policy.
Antofagasta’s operations are producing as normal, the company said yesterday in an e-mailed statement. Necessary safety precautions were being taken on the weather conditions, the Santiago-based company said.
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