Ministry suspends Freeport?s Grasberg open pit mine

The Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources has suspended activities at the Grasberg open pit mine of gold and copper giant PT Freeport Indonesia in Papua Province following an accident that killed one worker, Investor Daily reported on Wednesday.

The paper quoted Director General of Mineral and Coal at the ministry Bambang Gatot Ariyono as saying that the ministry has received report about the accident from PT Freeport, and a team has been assigned to investigate the incident, a process that may take about four days to complete.

Bambang said that according to the PT Freeport report, a backhoe fell from mine bench killing one worker and injuring another. He said that the mine suspension was imposed on Monday following the accident, and is still unclear as to when the suspension will be lifted.

As has been reported earlier by this portal, the Monday accident is the latest incident at PT Freeport mine in less than two months.

Late in August, a worker of PT Freeport was crushed to death by a wheel louder at the company?s mining compound in District Kuala Kencana, Timika, Papua Province.

In July of last year, one worker was killed during a work accident at its mine, and in January of last year one contract worker was killed. In February of this year, the company saw a landslide incident at its mine due to heavy rainfall, but no casualties were reported. (*)