UAF expects to incorporate more trips to the Delta center into the mining engineering curriculum in coming years. The idea is to sustain the kinds of experiences and train- ing previously available at the Sil- ver Fox Mine, which UAF students maintained for decades before its closure this year.
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“We have labs, but labs don’t substitute for a real mine,” said Tathagata Ghosh, chair of the De- partment of Mining and Mineral En- gineering in UAF’s College of Engi - neering and Mines. “We can’t do mining without real hands-on training.” That applies whether the topic is surveying, ventilation, rock me- chanics or explosives. “We can’t use explosives inside the engineering building,” he joked. “They can do everything,” at the Delta center, Ghosh said. “I’m not sure if there is any comparable fa- cility in the U.S.” Bill Bieber believes that’s true of not just the U.S. but the world.
GHOSH
BROKAW
BOWLING
“There’s no other facility like this,” said Bieber, director of UAF’s Soldotna-based Mining and Petro- leum Training Service, which oper- ates the MAPTS Mine Training Cen - ter. The center sits just east of the Alaska Highway’s bridge over the Gerstle River, 30 miles southeast of Delta Junction. There, MAPTS offers mine worker training sessions year-round. En- rollees spend two weeks at the site, take a two-week break and come back for a final two weeks. MAPTS, which is now a branch of UAF’s Cooperative Extension Service,
began operating the facility in 2014. It took over from the nonprofit or - ganization that had opened it about 15 years earlier. “The facility wasn’t anything like it is now,” Beiber said. “We added equipment, we completely rebuilt equipment that was there, and we completely rehabbed all the under- ground and surface stuff.” MAPTS also built a kitchen and dining facility and brought in a 30-person bunkhouse. “And we have a $1 million simu - lator as well,” Bieber added. CONTINUED on PAGE 12
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Winter 2022
The Alaska Miner
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