TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Freeport shipments continue amid suspension
Freeport-McMoRan Inc
Change text size
Gift Premium Articles
to Anyone
Share the best of The Jakarta Post with friends, family, or colleagues. As a subscriber, you can gift 3 to 5 articles each month that anyone can read—no subscription needed!
F
reeport-McMoRan Inc. said copper concentrate shipments from its Grasberg mine in Indonesia, the world's third-largest, are continuing amid a suspension of open-pit operations following a trucking accident.
Freeport halted work after the accident that killed four workers Sept. 27, it said in a statement dated Sept. 29. The government has asked Freeport's local unit to stop work at the section for a week, Investor Daily Indonesia reported on Tuesday, citing R. Sukhyar, the director general of coal and minerals at the Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry.
The workers at the mine in Papua province were killed after a light vehicle collided with a truck. It is the second accident this month after a mine operator died in a rockfall Sept. 12. The world's largest publicly traded copper producer halted operations at Grasberg for about one month in May 2013 after a tunnel collapse killed 28 workers.
The incident is not affecting output because the underground mine is still operational, the Investor Daily reported. Daisy Primayanti, a spokeswoman at Freeport Indonesia, in an e-mail reply said the company will provide an update on Tuesday. The Grasberg minerals district includes both open-pit and underground mines, according to the company's website.
Freeport Indonesia is working closely with a mine inspector from the energy ministry investigating the incident and full operations will only resume upon completion of 'internal socialization' of the accidents to all employees, it said in e-mailed statement on Sept. 28.
The Grasberg area produced metal sales of 885 million pounds of copper and 1.1 million ounces of gold in 2013, Freeport said in its annual report. It was the third-largest copper mine by capacity as of 2012, according to Bloomberg Intelligence data. BHP Billiton Ltd.'s Escondida and Codelco's Codelco Norte operation, both in Chile, were the largest.
