Kamfundwa Mine

The Kamoya South II Mine was opened in 1998 as a benched open cut secret mine. The "owners" of the mine employed a strict security force to prevent the miners taking specimens.[1] In early 2001, it was reported that the mine started to produce carrollite crystals of extraordinary size and quality. Some single crystals were almost as large as baseballs.[2] In fact, many specimens of carrollite were falsely attributed to Kamfundwa when it was still a secret location.[3]

Development partners were Harambee Mining Corp, the Swiss company Sogemin and the state-owned Gécamines. Harambee was prime for developing the copper-cobalt deposit at Kamfundwa.[4] As of 30 September 1999 an area about 1,500 metres (4,900 ft) long and from 200 metres (660 ft) to 600 metres (2,000 ft) wide had been drilled off to a depth of 260 metres (850 ft). A stockpile of about 300,000 tonnes of ore grading 4% copper and 0.3% cobalt had been built up.[5] The mine is now owned by Gécamines.[6] As of 2008 annual capacity was reported to be 400,000 tonnes copper in ore and 48,000 tonnes cobalt in ore.[7] Ore is transported to the concentrator at Kambove for processing.[8]