Victor Diamond Mine facts for kids
| Location | |
|---|---|
 Victor Mine
Location in Ontario
|
|
| Location | 90 km (56 mi) west of Attawapiskat |
| Province | Ontario |
| Country | Canada |
| Coordinates | 52°49′01″N 083°54′23″W / 52.81694°N 83.90639°W |
| Production | |
| Products | Diamonds |
| History | |
| Opened | 2008 |
| Closed | 2019 |
| Owner | |
| Company | De Beers |
The Victor Mine was a special place in Ontario, Canada. It was the very first diamond mine in this province. It was also the second diamond mine in Canada for a company called De Beers.
The mine was located in a faraway northern part of Ontario, about 90 kilometers (56 miles) west of a community called Attawapiskat. This area is known as the Northern Ontario Ring of Fire.
Before building the mine, the Attawapiskat First Nation community voted to approve an agreement in 2005. This agreement helped make sure the mine would benefit the community. Building the mine started in 2006 and created many jobs. The mine was an open-pit mine, which means diamonds were dug up from a large hole in the ground. It also had buildings for processing diamonds, workshops, and even its own airstrip. The Victor Mine stopped digging for diamonds in 2019. Now, the area is being cleaned up and returned to nature.
Contents
History of the Victor Mine
The company De Beers started looking for special rock formations called kimberlite pipes in Canada in the 1960s. Diamonds are often found in these pipes.
In 1987, 16 kimberlite pipes were found near Attawapiskat. These pipes became the basis for the Victor Mine. People became very interested in the Victor Mine project again in 1995.
In 2002, studies showed that it would be possible to mine diamonds there. The project was approved in 2005 after environmental checks by the government. Construction began soon after.
In 2007, another Indigenous group, the Moose Cree First Nations, also supported the mine. The first diamonds were successfully found that year. On June 20, 2008, the Victor Mine officially began producing diamonds.
De Beers made an agreement with the government of Ontario. This agreement allowed some of the diamonds to be cut and polished right in Ontario. In 2009, the Victor Mine was even named "Mine of the year" by a magazine called Mining Magazine.
What is the Geology of the Mine?
The area around the Victor Mine has 18 kimberlite pipes. These are like ancient "volcanoes" that brought diamond-rich rock closer to the surface. Sixteen of these pipes contain diamonds.
The Victor Mine dug diamonds from two main parts of the Victor pipe: Victor Main and Victor Southwest. These parts were close enough to the surface for open-pit mining. The rock in these pipes is made of different types of volcanic material. The amount of diamonds found in the rock could change a lot from one spot to another.
How Diamonds Were Mined
The Victor Mine was an open-pit mine. This means they dug a very large, deep hole in the ground to get to the diamonds.
They used huge machines like 100-tonne trucks, large front-end loaders, and bulldozers. These machines helped dig up and move the rock. The mine dug up about 2.7 million tonnes of rock each year. From this, they found about 600,000 carats of diamonds annually. A carat is a unit of weight for diamonds.
How the Mine Operated
The Victor Mine could be reached all year by air travel. It could only be reached by land during certain seasons, usually winter, when the ground was frozen enough for roads.
At the mine site, there were many important buildings. These included warehouses for storage, a plant to process the diamonds, workshops, and offices. There were also places to store fuel and machines to remove water from the pit. The airstrip was very important for getting people and supplies in and out.
The site also had dorms and recreational buildings for the people who worked there. The mine was expected to operate for about twelve years. The processing plant was designed to handle 2.5 million tonnes of kimberlite rock each year.
Tom Ormsby, who worked for De Beers Canada, said that the diamonds from Victor Mine were very special. He said they had great color, natural shapes, and were very clear and high quality. This made them some of the best diamonds in the world.
The mine was planned to last for 17 years from start to finish. This included building it, about 12 years of mining, and then closing down and cleaning up the site.
Mine Performance and Impact
The Victor Mine was very successful. It produced a lot of diamonds. In 2010, the mine produced 826,000 carats of diamonds.
De Beers also spent a lot of money on goods and services. In 2010, $93 million was spent, and $49 million of that (53%) went to businesses owned by Indigenous people. This helped support local communities.
In 2011, De Beers paid about $55.5 million in wages and benefits to its employees at Victor Mine. That same year, $101 million was spent on goods and services. About $57 million (57%) of this was provided by Indigenous businesses.
Looking for More Diamonds
Tom Ormsby also believed that there was a lot of potential for more diamond mines in northern Ontario. He said the "Canadian Shield," a large rocky area, was a great place to find diamonds. He even thought it might be twice as good as southern Africa for finding diamonds.
The Victor Mine had about eight years left of its planned life. To try and keep the mine going longer, they explored 15 other kimberlite pipes nearby. These pipes were already known to contain diamonds.
Environmental and Community Care
Safety was very important at the Victor Mine. Employees worked millions of hours without serious injuries.
People also thought about how the mine would affect the local Indigenous communities. De Beers promised to help these communities grow.
There were also concerns about the mine's impact on the environment. Since it was an open-pit mine, it changed the natural land. The mine affected about 5,000 hectares of land. In 2005, some environmental groups asked the Ontario government to do its own study. They wanted to make sure the mine would not harm the wildlife, wilderness, and water systems in the long term. However, the project did get an important environmental certification called ISO 14001.
Some people felt that the environmental study didn't look closely enough at how other Indigenous communities might be affected.
Working with Attawapiskat First Nation
The De Beers Victor Diamond Mine is on the traditional land of the Attawapiskat First Nation. In 2005, an agreement called an Impact-Benefit Agreement (IBA) was signed with the community leaders. This agreement was meant to share the benefits from the mine with the community.
However, some community members later protested. They felt that the money and benefits from the mine were not reaching the community as they should.
Even though the mine is on Attawapiskat's traditional land, the main payments from the mine went to the Government of Ontario. De Beers did pay up to $2 million each year to Attawapiskat. This money was split between a special fund controlled by the community's leaders and money for community development. It also helped pay Attawapiskat members who managed the agreement with De Beers.
The special fund grew to $13 million. In 2014, the community received about $1 million. Part of this went to business relations, and part was spent on community development.
The mine employed about 500 full-time workers, and 100 of them were from the Attawapiskat First Nation. De Beers also hired people from Attawapiskat to help build the winter roads.
A government review looked at the relationship between the mine and Attawapiskat. It found that support for training and skills development for the First Nation did not start early enough. However, training was done all year at the Victor Mine site and at a De Beers training center in Attawapiskat.
See also
- De Beers
- List of diamond mines
- Lake Timiskaming kimberlite field
- Northern Ontario
