Business as usual at mines after earthquake
Brian Benza | Wednesday April 5, 2017 18:00
The Botswana Geoscience Institute (BCI) yesterday confirmed that the earthquake, which was caused by tectonic movements of the earth, struck 132 kilometres west of Moiyabana village at a depth of 29 kilometres below the ground.
General manager of mothballed Ghaghoo Diamond Mine, Haile Mphusu said they had sent a team to assess the situation underground after only minimal damages were experienced on the surface.
Ghaghoo is estimated to be only 50 kilometres from the epicentre of the earthquake.
“On the surface, there was only very little damage with only things like utensils falling to the ground. We are lucky that we are currently not operating, so we had no workers underground but as of now we have sent a team down to assess if there could have been an major damage,” he said.
The earthquake took place just days after Ghaghoo was placed on care and maintenance due to weak diamond prices with all but just 50 workers laid off.
BCI noted that the earthquake was recorded by global seismic stations, including the Botswana station at Magotlhwane (LBTB) as well as stations in South Africa, Namibia and Kenya. The Institute also said it received reports from the public in Lobatse, Gaborone, Palapye, Selibe Phikwe, Jwaneng, Gantsi, and Maun confirming they felt the earthquake.
Media reports say tremors from the earthquake were felt as far as Zimbabwe and South Africa. Debswana corporate affairs manager, Matshidiso Kamona said following the earth tremor all pit and plant activities at Orapa, Letlhakane and Jwaneng mines were stopped immediately but operations resumed after a two-hour assessment break.
“As a safety precaution and in line with our emergency evacuation procedures, all employees were evacuated from the pit and plant areas. There were no reported injuries to people.
“Geotechnical and mining teams carried out visual inspections and systems checks of all our pits. Following this, the pits were declared safe and normal operations resumed after about two hours. “Similarly, visual inspections of plant structures such as slimes/slurry dams and tailing dumps were also carried out. The facilities were declared safe and normal operations resumed shortly thereafter,” she said.
This was the second largest recorded earthquake in Botswana since the October 11, 1952 event of 6.7 Richter scale magnitude located in the Maun area. One of the recent earthquakes in Botswana measuring 4.5 Richter scale magnitudes was recorded 15 years ago near Kalamare.
Tlou Energy, which is exploring for Coal Bed Methane (CBM) in the central district, also announced it had suffered no damages at its Lesedi project.