The red and white striped chimney with its black top chugs light brown smoke into the air, I'm not sure if it ever stops, or what it's chugging. It's only a few hundred metres away from this great kids playground where I sit and write. The taller brown, big brother, chimney also looms overhead but it does not smoke. The sound of the mine is like your next door neighbour vacuuming, that whirring noise, just audible, it can be heard a few kilometres away at night. Kinda like falling asleep to the sound of the ocean, but not. Around 8 o'clock in the morning and evening the earth trembles. It's not really that noticeable, like a rumble of thunder. It's the rock being blasted underground.
We were also warned about the 'bombing'. When the rocks get stuck in the bins they have to send in explosives to loosen it all up. This can happen at any time. We haven't heard that yet.
We went to the information centre this morning to see what they had. They have a display called Outback at Isa. I wasn't prepared to pay $35 for us all to get in, we've seen the outback and the boys just needed a park to run around in.
Fun fact: I've just learnt that the striped chimney is from the copper smelter and pumps out sulphur dioxide and when the plume rains down on the town it turns into sulphuric acid. The small white chimney nearby extracts the sulphur to make fertilizer but it wasn't running today.
The taller chimney is from the lead smelter and you really wouldn't want to get a whiff of that so that's why it's so tall.
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