Two people have been hospitalised in a tailings dam failure at a Brazil Gold mine.
Brazil’s mining regulator confirmed in a statement that a 15m high dam had ruptured at Mato Grosso state, with material spreading up to 2km.
The National Mining Agency said that regular inspections had not reported any anomalies in the past year and a statement of the condition of stability had been signed off by the technical manager, authorised by the Regional Council of Engineering and Architecture (CREA/MT), and by the owner of the company on September 25.
The burst reportedly had knocked down one of the high-voltage power poles in the regions and the electricity distributor had shut down the network to avoid other accidents.
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“At this time, a team of the company is performing the first operations and building a containment to prevent the tailings from advancing through an even greater area,” ANM said.
ANM was inspecting the area to determine measures and verify if there were other risks.
Tailings dam failure in Brazil have frequented news in recent years. Most notably the Vale Brumadinho iron ore mine tailings dam bursting in January, killing at least 250 and, the BHP Vale Samarco disaster.
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