Lightning Ridge,
Black-Opal-Mining-Industry

The start of the black-opal-mining-industry, as it is, was around the time the very first mineral claim was registered at the Lightning Ridge Police Station. The sergeant at the police station, was also an opal miner. Claim registrations consisted of placing a cross on a map of the area where the Claim had been pegged.

There are stories of mineral claim pegs moving over night. A miner would mine an area for a while and decide to move his claim further down the hill, or in another direction. Even over lap someone else's claim. Then there would be a dispute over who moved their pegs.

At that time, anyone from around world could come to Lightning ridge and enter the black-opal-mining-industry. There are about twenty-three different nationalities in Lightning Ridge. A tourist with no under ground mining experience at all could register a claim and begin mining.

It was not until the early 1970's that the Department of Mineral Resources began to control the registration of mineral claims in the black-opal-mining-industry, and record accidents in the Lightning Ridge Opal Fields. From 1977 until 1997 there was an average of one fatality every year. These deaths were the direct result of people with absolutely no underground mining experience at all attempting to find opal. These statistics showed the black-opal-mining-industry to be a very high risk section of the Australian mining industry, considering the number of fatalities to the number of miners working in the black-opal-mining-industry. Falling down uncovered mine shafts and roof falls were some of the common causes of these fatalities.

In 1997 The Department of Mineral Resources started to faze in a compulsory Mine Safety Course, , that every claim holder has to complete to enable them to register, or reregister their claims. The black-opal-mining-industry has been fatality free for 7 years. These figures are an obvious reflection of the safety courses.

To register a claim today, in the black-opal-mining-industry, a miner has to ensure the area he pegs, does not overlap another persons claim, and is inside the designated mining reserve. The area can be no larger then the equivalent of 50m+50m. (2500 sq m) The Department of Mineral Recourses has master survey pegs placed around the opal fields for miners to do an exact survey of their proposed claim. The miner then takes a copy of the survey and an Application to Register a Mineral Claim form to the Mineral Resources office with a registration fee of $100 and a $250 bond. After paying the fee he receives a number for his new claim, a photocopy of the opal field where he has registered his new claim and four metal tags which he takes to the stamping block at the back of the office where he stamps his claim numbers on them. The tags have to be attached to his claim posts with in fourteen days of registration.

A miner is permitted two claims of this size in his name. But he can have his wife and relatives do the Safety Course to enable him to have more than two claims. The registration has to be renewed every year, but there are no reminders issued by Mineral Resources, so if a miner forgets to renew his claim by the required date, it is automatically cancelled. This allows another miner to peg and register the lapsed claim. There have been some very rich claims change hands this way.

Once the claim is registered it is wise to put down some exploration holes with a prospecting drill which drills a small diameter hole, to try to locate where the opal is in the claim. Some miners in the black-opal-mining-industry use divining rods , the same used for divining water, to try to find a concentration of fault junctions. There is a better of chance of opal forming at these sites. A Caldwell Drilling Rig is used in the black-opal-mining-industry to drill a hole 42 inches in diameter down to the opal level that can be any where between 17 feet to 80 feet deep. A miner then goes down ladders and begins to bell out out the clay opal level with a jack hammer. He continues this until he has an area large enough to lower the rest of his mining gear down, and commence serious digging.

The low cost method used in the opal mining industry at lightning Ridge is with a jackhammer, a rickshaw and a hoist(a rickshaw is a two wheeled wheel barrow). This does not cost much money to set up but it is very hard work and production can be very slow.

The most costly way is using a hydraulic digger and a blower. A digger is a like a backhoe but it is smaller and built much stronger. It has hydraulic rams that clamp it between the floor and the roof. It is used to dig the hard clay level. Miners in theblack-opal-mining-industry have been very ingenious by inventing equipment to efficiently mine opal.

A blower is like a giant vacuum cleaner that sucks the dirt up to the surface through a ten inch diameter pipe and deposits it on to a truck. This way is by far the most expensive method used in the black-opal-mining-industry because the huge fan that creates the suction needs a lot of horse power to drive it.

The most economical method of mining in the black-opal-mining-industry is using a hydraulic digger, a bogger and a super hoist , which can haul half a ton of opal dirt to the surface in each bucket. The bogger is a small self filling, self tipping, skid steer truck that holds half a ton of opal dirt. This type of set up is very mechanical and requires quite a bit of skill to keep it all operational. A 40 kva generator runs this mining equipment and is very economical in comparison to a blower. I have no idea why it was called a blower because it actually sucks.

When a miner no longer wants a claim he can transfer it, sell it, or cancel it. To cancel a claim he has to ensure the entire area is free of opal dirt, all drill holes filled in, and submit an Application to Cancel a Mineral Claim form, to Mineral Resources who then come and inspect the claim before returning his bond.

Miners who have been fortunate enough to have a very good claim can sometimes have opal stolen from there mine. The people that do this are called ratters. They are the most despised people in the black-opal-mining-industry, because, not only do they steal a miners hard earned opal, but because they are in such a rush when digging it out a lot of opal gets smashed into little pieces. This is one of the reasons why opal miners are very secretive about how much opal they are finding.

In the black-opal-mining-industry at Lightning, the term used for fossickers is

Noodlers . These are people that go through a miner's discarded dirt looking for opal that may have been missed. There are allocated dirt dumps around the black opal mining fields where all excess opal dirt is dumped. A miner who dose not have processing facilities may use this as an indicator to check if he is throwing opal away. If he returns to the dump with a load of dirt and sees the previous load has been totally levelled with noodlers still going through it, he would know he had made a big, big mistake. Some people treat noodling like a job and do quite well from it.

When mining the fields closer to Lightning Ridge, we have to process our opal dirt because the opal is in the form of nobbies, which is very hard to see while mining. This dirt is washed in a cement truck agitator so as to achieve a %100 recovery. These agitators are mounted on a large dam wall and use a conveyor belt to feed the opal dirt into it. The dirt is fed onto this conveyor from a small opening in the tailgate of a tip truck. Water is pumped into the agitator and mixed with the opal dirt. The water and slurry is washed out through sieves cut in the sides of the agitator bowl. This process breaks the opal clay down, until the only thing left is the very hard material, which is mostly opal and potch. There is very little noodling done on these fields because all of the opal dirt is processed.

There are two small dams at the Grawin opal fields for processing opal dirt with one privately owned. A very large 25 site dam is proposed for the Grawin area but is still to be built. This dam will be of great benefit to the black-opal-mining-industry in this area. These dam sites are sometimes a target for ratters because miner's leave opal dirt in there agitators over night. They make it hard for the ratter to steal there opal by depositing a truck load of dirt into the agitator before turning it off at night. This hides all the potch and opal in a full truck load of wet, muddy opal dirt.

The excitement of discovering a patch of beautiful opal, is why a miner endures the extremes of harsh conditions, hard work and sometimes poverty. When there are extended periods of not finding any saleable opal at all, it can be quite depressing. The best way to over come this is not get too excited in the good times, as this tends to level out the highs and lows.

There is an old saying here, "there's a lot of dirt between the opal". That's why it is almost essential to have as much mining gear as possible, and move as much dirt as possible, to hopefully find a patch of beautiful gems.

A very small number of miners, with limited equipment, have been extremely lucky and found large amounts of quality black opal. Whereas others with a lot of equipment just survive.

The serious opal miners, like ourselves, treat opal mining like any small business. Having the equipment, good luck and hard work sometimes pays off.

Until early this year opal prices have been the lowest they have ever been.

Since the beginning of 2004 opal buyers have been very active in Lightning Ridge and are paying slightly higher prices. Many miners have left the industry due to lack of working capital, so there is a shortage in supply. Of course opal miners are very happy to see this slight rise in prices. This can only be positive for the black-opal-mining-industry.

Black opal is a non-renewable resource and it is becoming rare. If you have ever wanted to own a beautiful piece of black opal then now is the time to buy, because it will never be this low priced again.

have been very active in Lightning Ridge and are paying slightly higher prices. Many miners have left the industry due to lack of working capital, so there is a shortage in supply. Of course opal miners are very happy to see this slight rise in prices. This can only be positive for the black-opal-mining-industry.

Black opal is a non-renewable resource and it is becoming rare. If you have ever wanted to own a beautiful piece of black opal then now is the time to buy, because it will never be this low priced again.

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