Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, May 9, 1990 TAG: 9005090050
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-3 EDITION: STATE
SOURCE:
DATELINE: DUTY LENGTH: Short
Coal Group President Mike Odom will present the keys to a 425,000-pound, 16-cubic-yard capacity Demag H185 hydraulic front shovel to an employee to operate it at the Black Thunder Surface Mine and to take the ceremonial first scoop.
The machine was built in Germany, was disassembled and shipped to the United States, and required nine flatbed trucks to carry its components from an Eastern seaport to Buchanan County.
That first scoop of dirt will be dumped into another big piece of equipment, a Caterpillar 777B truck capable of handling 95-ton loads. Other new equipment at the site includes a 190,000-pound Caterpillar D11N track-type tractor with a 42.2-cubic yard blade, the largest tractor currently being used in Virginia.
The Black Thunder mine is operated by Pittston's Clinchfield Coal Co. It opened last September and employs 60 people in three shifts.
About 600 acres will be mined and reclaimed, with annual production expected to reach 650,000 tons of low-sulphur coal sold in the metallurgical export market to Japan and in the domestic utility market.
The mine site is near the Buchanan-Dickenson county border off Virginia 601. The ceremony introducing the giant shovel will start at 11 a.m.
- Southwest bureau
by CNB