This silent 1950s home movie shows some of the mining operations for
blue asbestos at Kuruman, South Africa. The entire film was shot outside
the mine itself, which was underground (opening visible at 1:46)
and you can see ore cars being moved to and from the mine at :33. Ore
is moved on a series of conveyer belts (:45) to be processed. At 2:12, a supervisor wearing a pith type helmet pours himself a drink.At 2:15 mine tailings are visible. At 2:42
the scene switches to the blue asbestos mines at Westerburg and Koegas
at Prieska. Unfortunately most of the people you see in this film likely
died of exposure to asbestos. According to an article on the Internet:
"A large part of Prieska's 15,000 population worked in the asbestos mill
at the edge of town, for a long time the town's main source of
employment; others were employed at local mines. Three thousand
residents of the region have already died of asbestos-related diseases,
and the list is growing longer by the week. "Prieska is a living
graveyard," says Cecil Skeffers, the town's community development
worker. He watched his own father die recently, his breath slowly choked
away."

At 2:58, men bore into the shored-up rock wall with a drill. At 3:23 ore cars depart the mine via a mechanized cable. At 3:44 they are pushed to be processed. At 3:55 a sifting mechanism is used to find asbestos crystals. At 4:20, children are seen at the mine processing area. At 5:24, another look at the machinery used in processing. At 6:28, a long sweeping shot of what might be the Prieska town, with tailings visible. At 7:00,
more rock sifting is shown, distant smoke is likely from the smelter.
At around 9 minutes, a segment of the film footage is repeated or
"duped".

All the mines shown were located in the Asbestos Mountains range, hills
in the Northern Cape province of South Africa, stretching
south-southwest from Kuruman, where the range is known as the Kuruman
Hills, to Prieska. The range lies about 150 km west of Kimberley and
rises from the Ghaap Plateau. The mountains were named for the asbestos
which was mined in the 20th century and is found as a variety of
amphibole called crocidolite. Veins occur in slaty rocks, and are
associated with jaspers and quartzites rich in magnetite and brown
iron-ore. Geologically it belongs to the Griquatown series.

Asbestos is a set of six naturally occurring silicate minerals, which
all have in common their eponymous asbestiform habit: i.e. long (roughly
1:20
aspect ratio), thin fibrous crystals, with each visible fiber composed
of millions of microscopic "fibrils" that can be released by abrasion
and other processes. They are commonly known by their colors, as blue
asbestos, brown asbestos, white asbestos, and green asbestos.

Asbestos mining existed more than 4,000 years ago, but large-scale
mining began at the end of the 19th century, when manufacturers and
builders began using asbestos for its desirable physical properties.
Some of those properties are sound absorption, average tensile strength,
affordability, and resistance to fire, heat, and electricity. It was
used in such applications as electrical insulation for hotplate wiring
and in building insulation. When asbestos is used for its resistance to
fire or heat, the fibers are often mixed with cement or woven into
fabric or mats. Asbestos use continued to grow through most of the 20th
century until public knowledge (acting through courts and legislatures)
of the health hazards of asbestos dust outlawed asbestos in mainstream
construction and fireproofing in most countries.

Prolonged inhalation of asbestos fibers can cause serious and fatal
illnesses including lung cancer, mesothelioma, and asbestosis (a type of
pneumoconiosis). By the 1980s and 1990s, asbestos trade and use were
heavily restricted, phased out, or banned outright in an increasing
number of countries.

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This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest
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for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com

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