Koolan Island is an island off the Kimberley coast of Western Australia

Western Australia

Western Australia is a state of Australia, occupying the entire western third of the Australian continent. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Great Australian Bight and Indian Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east and South Australia to the south-east...

 in the Buccaneer Archipelago

Buccaneer Archipelago

The Buccaneer Archipelago is a group of islands off the coast of Western Australia near the town of Derby in the Kimberley region. The closest inhabited place is Bardi located about from the western end of the island group....

. It is about 1,900 km north of Perth

Perth, Western Australia

Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia and the fourth most populous city in Australia. The Perth metropolitan area has an estimated population of almost 1,700,000....

, and about 130 km north of Derby

Derby, Western Australia

Derby is a town in the Kimberley region of Western Australia. At the 2006 census, Derby had a population of 3,093. Along with Broome and Kununurra, it is one of only three towns in the Kimberley to have a population over 2,000...

. It holds deposits of high grade iron ore.

BHP era

BHP

BHP Billiton

BHP Billiton is a global mining, oil and gas company headquartered in Melbourne, Australia and with a major management office in London, United Kingdom...

 commenced open-pit mining

Open-pit mining

Open-pit mining or opencast mining refers to a method of extracting rock or minerals from the earth by their removal from an open pit or borrow....

 operations on Koolan and neighbouring Cockatoo Island in the late 1940s and by 1963 had established substantial mining operations there. The Koolan Island mine closed in 1994 after BHP had extracted 68 million tonnes of high-grade haematite ore averaging 67% iron.

At its peak, Koolan Island had a population of 950 people and had a school, police station, recreation facilities and shops. It had the world's then-longest golf course hole — an 860 yards par 7 number 6 which doubled as the island's air strip.

Major rehabilitation of the island was undertaken since the mine closure

Mine closure

Mine closure is the period of time when the ore-extracting activities of a mine have ceased, and final decommissioning and mine reclamation are being completed. It is generally associated with reduced employment levels, which can have a significant negative impact on local economies...

, with buildings and exotic vegetation removed. Extensive replanting of native species has been undertaken.

Mine

When BHP ceased mining operations on the island in 1993 they flooded the Main Pit to the ocean by blasting part of the hanging wall. This has meant that the pit has been filled with approximately 10 billion litres of sea water, with a significant marine eco-system forming within the bounds of the former working pit. Due to the dense nature of the marine fauna within the Main Pit, Mount Gibson Iron plan to utilise numerous substantial blasts within the water filled pit in order to extract all marine creatures before dewatering operations are commenced. A Seawall will then be built around the ocean side of the pit in order to keep the ocean out. The pit will subsequently be dewatered in order to allow the rich ore reserves to be mined once again.

Earlier, in April 2006, the company signed a co-existence agreement with the Dambimangari (Dambima-Ngardi) indigenous Australian traditional owners of the island. The agreement aims to ensure that 3% of the 220 person workforce is filled by indigenous people by the eighth year
of operation.

A third island nearby, Irvine Island

Irvine Island

Irvine Island is located off the Kimberley coast of Western Australia in the Buccaneer Archipelago. It is about 250 km north-east of Broome, 140 km north of Derby and hosts an unmined deposit of iron ore...

 is also being considered for mining operations.

On 18 August 2006, Aztec announced that it had signed orders with the Chinese

China

Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

 group CITIC

CITIC

Not to be confused with Citigroup, another large financial services company.Not to be confused with CIT Group, another large financial services company....

 for 1.5 million tonnes of ore from 2007.

Aircraft crash

On December 23 1984, a single-engined Cessna 210

Cessna 210

The Cessna 210 Centurion is a six-seat, high-performance, retractable-gear single-engine general aviation aircraft which was first flown in January 1957 and produced by Cessna until 1985.-Design and development:...

 aircraft, which had just taken off from the island en route to Broome, struck power lines and somersaulted. 6 people were killed.

It appears the aircraft may have been overloaded with passengers and fuel at the time. The plane took off with the wind towards the batching plant rather than over the ocean and Submarine rock

External links

• Koolan Island transcript from George Negus Tonight 21 June 2004
• Credit Suisse investors report 11 March, 2005
• Aztec Resources Commences Construction on Koolan Island Project from Yahoo Finance F 26 June, 2006