T & S Down Under

Mary Kathleen was 1st settled during the 1950s.Uranium discovered by Glen Walton & Norm Conachy in 1954, the deposit & township named after late wife of McConachy. In 1955 Rio Tinto mining formed Mary Kathleen Uranium Ltd to develop a mine & service town. A architect- designed town grew during 1956-1958, with reticulated water from the dam, Lake Corella. A sale contract with UK Atomic Energy Authority was signed end of 1958. The cost of $24 million MCU ( Mary Katherine Uranium)was to develop uranium deposits & work commenced constructing the township , mine & Dam the nearby Corella River . The ore was mined by open cut method & processed on site. 4,080 tonnes of uranium oxide extracted between 1958 & 1963. 1st phase from 1958 to 1963 treated 2.9 million tonnes of ore at average grade of 0.13% to yield 4082 t (4500short tons or 9 million pounds weight of U308) of uranium concentrate ( then actually yellow/cake- ammonium diuranate) containing 3460 tonnes of uranium . By 1963 the major supply contract had been satisfied ahead of schedule , & large reserved of ore lay on grass. Consequently the works closed down . The mine lay idle till 1974 when it re opened contracts with Japanese, German & USA power utilities prompted re/opening. By 1982 it was finally exhausted . The town was built around a shallow valley with post office, cinema, sports ovals, a school, banks & community store & churches . The school open in July 1956, temporary hospital facility in March 1957, in May 1957 saw the first water pumped from Lake Corella Dam . By 1961 1000 people lived in this new township. By 1982 the township, mine & mill were dismantled & the tailings rehabilitated by the end of 1984. The site, now only roads & concrete pads can be accessed as an overnight camping areas. It’s very strange seeing photos of what was once here, still some tiles remain which was once on a store floor. The map shows what was once. Even to this day a few flowering bushes remain. Everything was sold off & all that remains now is slabs where buildings once stood. Even a path which was at the back of a house is still the hole in concrete where once a clothes line stood. Curb stones around streets, the ole water fountain stands empty,parking area which was once a shopping town . The Ghost Gum trees I feel are very suited to this once lively mining town. Since rehabilitation , it is been found that the tailings repository at Mary Kathleen site has been subject to seepage of radioactive waters from both toe of the dam & the surface at rates much higher than initially predicted. The radioactive waste had seeped into former evaporation ponds as well as local drainage systems, causing widespread death of native vegetation . This issue to this day remains unresolved .Read more