Gold King spill stirs concerns about New Mexico’s old mines

The ongoing fallout in New Mexico from last month’s Colorado mine spill is a stark reminder that the “Land of Enchantment” has its own dangerous mines. While public officials continue to measure the damage wrought by the Gold King Mine spill, some say it’s a wake-up call to the staggering number of abandoned mines in New Mexico. The Bureau of Land Management so far has identified more than 13,000 abandoned mines in or around public land in the state, according to bureau records. Nearly 9,000 of them need to be analyzed, federal officials said. Bill Auby, the head of the abandoned mines program for the BLM in New Mexico, said it will take a great deal of time to track these sites. “It’s going to be a long process to get to all the mining districts and wander the hills and find these things and identify them,” Auby said. An analysis of BLM data by the Santa Fe New Mexican found that 90 percent of the mines identified in New Mexico – or 11,750 – have not been remediated. According to the agency’s reports, BLM officials found waste rock and tailings in 260 mines, including 20 in the Cerrillos Hills Mining District. The highest concentrated number of mines was found in the Hillsboro Mining District. Some officials, however, say the state’s arid environment lessens the possibility of pressurized water pushing out old mining waste like it did in the Colorado spill Aug. 5...more