Diamond Mining - Inside the largest Mine in the World | Free Short Documentary

how much money is now on the table yeah $5,000,000 $5,000,000 just on this table Siberia the middle of nowhere in it the city of many and its existence has one reason only the mere diamond mine one of the largest ones in the world almost forty thousand people live in many in the midst of snow ice and - fifty degrees whether it's hard to imagine but this is the epicenter of the Russian diamond mining industry and we want to see these diamonds after more than a year of research we finally got filming permit from the world's second largest diamonds producer al Rosa but first we are try to be put off unfortunately we can't go down to the mere mine just yet but there's a view of it from the platform is that ok let's go the morning shift is still working underground and we are not to interrupt them but the view is worth the waiting well this is insane enormous unsurprisingly this is one of the deepest man-made holds on earth it's one thousand seven hundred twenty two feet deep on top of that its diameter is an astonishing three thousand nine hundred feet wide the mere diamond mine is so big that you can even see the crater from space but opencast mining has gone dormant for the past 15 years the mine has been so overworked that its wards are at risk of caving in a grave danger for workers but underground mining continues the entrance is right around the corner and thanks to a special permit we can see it from up close but underground mining isn't without its dangers that's why we have to receive safety training first [Music] so Moscow said this is a so-called self rescuer the most important thing to carry on the ground it's used when there's an accident involving a gas or smoke leak during concedes the breathing apparatus provides around 50 minutes of oxygen and we even have to sign a waiver where if something happens it's our own responsibility but we came to see diamonds and in order to do so we have to go into the mine and our companion is the shift manager sagaie gamble and the boss is to show us how business is done around here hurry up we've gotta move Tookie Tookie I think it means we have to move faster correct these pitman have to stick to a strict schedule many of them are day workers if they miss the lift down into the mine they lose their wages there's only one person for whom Sergey still has some time David my wife the mere miners run like a family business and has been so for 60 years now it's finally time to head out most equipments such as the lift dates back to the Soviet era but it still carries the miners deep down three times per day we don't know exactly how deep and that's cause for a confusion no no hey cameraman andreas come back here we won't be there for a bit we have to keep going even deeper a total of three thousand two hundred eighty feet into the ground it's easy to get lost the diamond mine resembles a maze and it's the deepest one in the world at three thousand nine hundred feet underground we were expecting extreme heat and stuffy air underground but it's not nearly as bad surprisingly what's been really Pleasant has been the fact that we're at around 60 degrees in here so about 70 degrees warmer than outside which really makes a difference escaping the icy cold try Berrian weather is just one of the many reasons why sergey loves working underground in many i've always found a romantic side to this place and this job I've always been very enthusiastic because this means more than just good money to me above all the contact with my colleagues is important to me I'm very happy to still have this job but it's a very dangerous job surprise fires and smoke in narrow aisles are not uncommon and sometimes even a simple bump on the ground is a risk look out I warned you [Laughter] fortunately after this little stunt we no longer need to move by foot because Pittman like Sergei also have a company car he drives us to the side three-quarters of a mile away a huge machine is waiting for Sergei there the most coveted object a massive stone wall Sergei is so determined it is clear to us that our treasure is hiding from us behind the wall we've no idea whether there are diamonds behind it or not we're not geologists we're just the workers who dig the rocks out from the wall we get clear instructions and there we drill but there are diamonds everywhere even if we don't know exactly where we'll manage to find them that's because underneath money there's a gigantic deposit of the volcanic mineral kimberlite and in a very rare composition as well they're teeming with diamonds what is special about it is that not every kimberlite contains valuable minerals but in many an extraordinary amount of them do Serge's job is to mind the rocks out of the wall with this monster these steel milling machines have been specially developed for mining being able of crushing concrete even all that is missing is the truck that collects the diamonds hey be careful where you go do you want everything to collapse above us incredible unbelievable but after a little drama now we can get started even if it looks brutal the mining doesn't hurt the diamonds they're the hardest mineral in the world and are close to being indestructible but there's still no trace of the precious stones oh it's extremely dusty in here a dirty business but diamonds are not just to craft fine pieces of jewelry due to their sturdiness they're particularly popular in industry ample in drilling systems or high-tech tools but so far no okay I keep this other diamonds inside right now there are some in there yes but I can't see anything with just a stone there are no diamonds maybe not particularly expensive ones but there are definitely some in there nope okay well it was worth a try the stones are on their last journey underground with a lorry into the collection bunker around 400 tons of rock can be found here every day ready to be transported to the surface where exactly more of that later [Music] for Sergei and his crew today's job is done everything down here is still an adventure to me I love my job the atmosphere what I like most is the comradeship and above all my after work beer that's what you get after eight hours of hard work at 8 p.m. Sergei and the other Pittman head back to the surface and so ends our first day in merely the next morning as an exception we are allowed to witness an explosion underground they're prohibited that's why we are headed to an active opencast mine since there are no scheduled flights to many we hit you right with a company's own airline to nearby about 250 miles away here we meet production manager Dimitri shook wings just as it was the case underground everything has to be done really fast above ground we're running a bit behind to be honest we're actually very late I hope we can still make it why is he in a rush the blasting master has to struggle with adverse conditions in the Siberian winter he fears the detonator could freeze at minus 25 degrees therefore we have to go go go [Music] it seems to have worked but it's all too quiet now the stones have been loosened the work can begin again half an hour later the first trucks drive into the heart of the mine in contrast to mere kimberlite can still be mined above-ground here but how do the stones become diamonds now the secret may be revealed the final production takes place here the first impression is that it's gigantic all stones from both the upper and lower quarries are collected in one place dimitri shows us what happens here the stones are delivered and then fall through this shaft from the outside the machine down there stomps and crushes them since many are still quite big boulders no diamond in the world is the size of a rock that's why the stones are gently grounded into smaller and smaller proportions little by little they'll be brought down to your diameter of about five inches the widest the diamond can be and large enough to fit through these holes but we still can't see them this could change now however in any case something very very important does happen here warning signs double doors and suddenly a lot more security personnel we seem to be very close to our goal at last behind this store we expect to find what we've been looking for all this time but all we see are more dirty stones it's a kind of x-ray machine in connection with a special concentrate here we filter out the diamonds but you're not allowed to shell that the machine scans the stones and simply sorts out the ones without diamonds the ones with value end up in a sulfuric chemical bath the mixture is top secret but it's used to separate the kimberlite volcanic stone from the diamond but these are just stones unfortunately we can't see the complete procedure we were expecting diamonds and all we got was a secrecy but we're come here you have to hand over your passport we enter a rather unremarkable room what is striking is that only women sit here and they're handling what we've been looking for all this time diamonds a whole bunch of them too so many that we can't count them all they're in their raw form since they won't be smoothened for a while these women have an especially important task under the guidance of the only man present here we determine the price of the diamonds in order to do this we sort them by size and weight the weight is measured per carat one carat is 0.007 ounces but these stones are much heavier that sparked our interest why not the diamond could fall and be damaged who pays for that afterwards only the employees are allowed to handle them they earn around $1,100 per month which is good money here but a little something extra in the pocket would be tempting no I would never take a stone home the reason diamonds are cataloged before being transported of only one of them goes missing then everyone has to pay for it and that can be really expensive how much money is now on the table here five million dollars in addition to size and weight the diamonds so-called purity also affects this price the employees sought the rough diamonds according to 16 color categories the following applies the pure for example the clearance color the more valuable particularly dark diamonds cost around ten dollars per carat nothing compared to those that are almost as see-through as glass and although there is more money lying around here than women will ever earn in their lives they act normal around it it's not special for us I've developed a kind of immunity to the huge amount of money I work with every day to me personally these are only stones cookie pigeon usually premium or more foolish spoken quite valuable stones though the demand in Russia is so great that they can only be sold domestically and there is plenty more of it here

Channel: Doc Bites

Views: 1,923,810

Rating: 4.8016658 out of 5

Keywords: Free Documentary, Documentaries, Full documentary, HD documentary, Short Documentary, Short Docs, Documentary (TV Genre), Documentary - topic, Diamond, Diamonds, Diamond Mining, Mining Documentary, Mining, Diamond Documentary, Russia, Russia Documenary, Siberia, Siberia Documentary, Mirny mine, Mir Mine, mirny, Yakutia, open cast mining, opencast mining, Russian Far East, Asian Russia, Asia, Yakutsk, De Beers, industrial diamonds, diamonds are a girl's best friend, Brilliant

Id: Z3IDnEOUIWM

Length: 16min 5sec (965 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 22 2020