Australia

BHP took over Burwood Colliery from the Scottish Australian Mining Co. on September 21st 1932. At that time the main shaft was 600ft deep to the Borehole seam which was 5ft 6ins to 7ft thick. Eight shortwall cutting machines were in use and the output was 1,450 tons per day.

The original Lambton Colliery was opened in 1862 by the Scottish Australian Mining Company at a site nine miles south of Newcastle. After mixed fortunes over the years the Lambton B pit was acquired in 1932 by the Broken Hill Proprietary Company Limited (BHP) in order to supply increasing amounts of coking coal to its Newcastle Steelworks. There were two seams of coal — the virgin Victoria Tunnel or Burwood seam at a depth of 200 ft. in the main shaft, and the Borehole seam, found at a depth of 430 ft. from the surface. Electric power was supplied by John Darling Colliery, situated three miles south of Lambton. The colliery was finally closed in 1991.

John Darling Colliery of The Broken Hill Proprietary Co Ltd, c1937. The colliery was situated 12 miles south of Newcastle. The sinking of the two 22ft diameter shafts commenced in 1925. Both shafts were lined with concrete apart from 20ft at the surface. The Victoria Tunnel seam was reached on June 10, 1927, at a depth of 650ft, with a thickness of 10ft 3in, of which 5ft 9in was workable. In all, eight seams were proved, with a total thickness of 130ft. The average daily output in 1937 was 2,400 tons hand mined from the Victoria Seam (2,150 tons) and the Borehole Seam (350 tons). Pillars were worked simultaneously with the bords, resulting in almost the whole of the seam being extracted.

There is a surprising amount of terracotta architecture in Sydney. I do not know what this building on Hay Street in the centre of the city was when first built, but it has some fine decorative detail.

The Viterra grain silos at the port of Wallaroo on the Spencer Gulf are connected to the jetty by conveyors and can load ships with wheat or barley at 600 tonnes per hour.

Coke movement from the storage bunkers at the Port Pirie smelter is by this telpher and grab. Mangrove Rat suggested an early start to catch the light around the harbour and smelter area, and it was certainly worth the effort.

Genessee & Wyoming 700 class locomotive heads an Adelaide bound freight across the B56 Main North Rd crossing at Winninowie south of Port Augusta.

Viterra owned grain silos at Port Pirie on the Spencer Gulf in South Australia. The maximum loading capacity under the spouts is 800 tonnes per hour.

Junction Mine at Broken Hill was developed from 1884 and from 1886 to closure in 1923 the Broken Hill Junction Silver Mining Co. produced ore to the value of £1.2 million. The mine was reworked by North Broken Hill Ltd between 1946 and 1962, and again by South Broken Hill Ltd. until 1972. The wooden headframe is the oldest on the line of lode and was erected at Browne Shaft in the 1890s athough it has been modified several times. The winding enginehouse and ore bins here date from the 1946 reworking.

The wasteland in and around the waste tips at the Moonta cooper mines is a relic of the later years of operations on the site. Copper ore was mined at Moonta from 1862 until 1923, but copper metal was produced there for another twenty years after the mines closed. Copper was being extracted from the waste dumps by acid leaching from 1901 onward, and when mining ceased, the process continued for another generation. While the quantities of copper produced were never large, the process was capable of operating at virtually no cost, utilising principally seawater, by-product sulphuric acid and scrap metal, and consuming minimal labour and fuel. Best seen original size .

The Palisade Hotel at Millers Point in Sydney was designed by Henry D. opened in 1912, replacing an earlier hotel of the same name. The name came from the palisade fence built between Munn Street and Bettington Street. It overlooks the wharves in Walsh Bay and was once popular with the dock workers in the area. The business closed for renovations some years ago and was still boarded and empty when I visited in 2012.

The Burra Burra Copper Mine (The Monster Mine) was established in 1848 mining the copper deposit discovered in 1845. Miners and townspeople migrated to Burra primarily from Cornwall, Wales, Scotland and Germany. The mine first closed in 1877, briefly opened again early in the 20th century and for a last time from 1970-1981. The Burra mines supplied 89% of South Australia's and 5% of the world’s copper for 15 years and the settlement has been credited (along with the mines at Kapunda) with saving the economy of the struggling new colony of South Australia.

The Grace Building is a historic building located in Sydney, New South Wales Australia. Designed by Morrow & Gordon and built by Kell & Rigby during the late 1920s, it was opened in 1930 by Grace Brothers (!), the Australian department store magnates, as their headquarters. The building was Inspired by the neo-Gothic Tribune Tower in Chicago and designed for a department store on the first two floors and office rental space above. It was extensively refurbished and restored in the 1990s and since June 1997, it has operated as a luxury hotel known as "the Grace Sydney".

On display at Woomerra is this AVRO Blue Steel missile which was developed as Britain's strategic air launched nuclear warhead delivery system in the 1950s although it did not go into service until 1963. Carried by Vulcan and Victor bombers the missile was reputedly very unreliable and also had a very short range. Its role was replaced by submarine launched Polaris missiles from 1968.

Evening draws nigh at Burra where we had stopped to view the "Monster Mine" that once yielded significant amounts of copper. This is a nice little town with a lot of heritage features to seek out.

This corrugated iron church in Broken Hill was moved to this site in 1911 having previously served as Picton Methodist Church on Kaolin Street. The adjacent hall was moved from Blende Street Methodist Church when that closed in 1926.

Junction Mine at Broken Hill was developed from 1884 and from 1886 to closure in 1923 the Broken Hill Junction Silver Mining Co. produced ore to the value of £1.2 million. The mine was reworked by North Broken Hill Ltd between 1946 and 1962, and again by South Broken Hill Ltd. until 1972. The wooden headframe is the oldest on the line of lode and was erected at Browne Shaft in the 1890s although it has been modified several times. The winding enginehouse and ore bins here date from the 1946 reworking.

Disused Cornish boilers are scattered across the ground adjacent to Taylor's Shaft at the Moonta Copper Mines in South Australia. These vessels have been used for water storage after their steamraising days were over. Richman's 1869 enginehouse which housed a 32 inch Cornish beam engine driving crushing and concentration machinery stands in the background. The large tailings dump was reworked by leaching with seawater in the 1920s and 30s and the terraced effect dates from those times.