Mount Lyell Mine.

An old Caterpillar D8 with La Plant Choate hydraulic blade getting ready to tow start one of the Fodens. By the look of the chocks in front of the wheels the truck may have a parking brake problem, definitely wouldn't have spring brakes, probably only hydraulic brakes for an old Foden like this. Looks like a bloody awful place to work, looks like it rains a lot.

Chevy Explosives truck.

Another very interesting set of photos.
I don't know how many mines, or even how many companies.
There were two zones: Mt Lyell, and north Mt Lyell.
The rival companies each built a railway from mine to port. The north was the better engineered, but closed first. A lot of it is available as a 4wd track today.
The Mt Lyell one lingered to 1963, was closed and dismantled, then was rebuilt with federal and state money as a sop for the scaling back of forestry. News of the week is that the franchisee has announced the suspension of operation.
The famous Australian historian Geoffrey Blainey authored a book (Peaks of Lyell?).
One chapter covers the c1912 Mt Lyell mine disaster. IIRC that was the worst mining disaster to that date in Australia. It was notable in the logistics of assembling the rescue operation, and in its changing the attitudes of management and safety.
Initially the company held off, then called for assistance too late.
Experienced mine workers and equipment came from the gold mines of Ballarat and Bendigo (Victoria); steamship Loongana made a record sprint from Melbourne to Burnie; Emu Bay Railway had had a train on standby all night for the dawn arrival, and dashed over its tracks to Zeehan, with a connection over the government railway to Strahan, and the Mt Lyell railway to Queenstown.
There is a lot available on this disaster by googling.

Roderick B Smith
Rail News Victoria Editor

Thanks Roderick, all very interesting. 100 years or so after the Mt. Lyell Disaster, men are still dying in underground mines-Pike River Disaster in New Zealand-November 2010, 29 dead.

I was lucky enough to have had a tour (unofficial) of the mine about 26 years ago, big setup! They ran a decline shaft to the bottom 1 1/2 Km down! IIRC.

Queenstown was cold and it was wet! It rained every day for three weeks exept for one day......It SNOWED!

When the rack railway was reopened after rebuilding, a website was put up by Queenstown secondary students: 'Hi, we are the kids of Queenstown High, where it rains 364 days per year, so we have lots of time to work on this website...'.

Here is something on SS Loongana. It was the height of contemporary elegant style, the first steam turbine ship in the southern hemisphere, and already had the reputation of being the fastest vessel in Australian waters when it made the famous dash. It had a service speed of 36 km/h, and averaged 40 km/h for this event.
Less known, the Victorian government survey/work vessel had set out hours earlier, but was much slower, and had trouble with the swell.
Loongana stands in my own family history. In its declining years, it was the vessel on which my father travelled as a 14 yo for a holiday with relatives: Melbourne - Launceston.

There are other great tales of record dashes for similar heroics.
One was a NZ train, taking the horse-drawn steam fire pump from Hastings or Napier to combat a fire in the other.

One which appeared in the Victorian primary-school readers, staple for two generations, was the successful rescue of the trapped miner Varischetti at Coolgardie. A diver and gear raced from Perth on a special train. The loco, with an interpretive panel, is on display at Midland (WA). See:
www.smh.com.au/news/national/a-great-sur...5/1146335930445.html

Roderick B Smith
Rail News Victoria Editor

Hi Roderick.
I remember that train and the story.
My family used to shop at Centrepoint Midland where the train was on display.
Last time through there it was gone,dont know where too.
Anyway here is a pic of the train with my girls in '07.

Another photo of a face shovel loading one the Foden semi trailer Dump Trucks.

A big Ruston Bucyrus face shovel, possibly a 100RB loading Euclid Dump Trucks-probably Scottish built R27 or R30models. R27s were-B2TD/Cummins NT335-C or B5TD/Cummins NRT-6B. The bigger R30 models were available as B7TD/Cummins NT380-C or B8TD/GM12V71N or (not sure what coding) Rolls Royce C8TFL.

A Caterpillar 988 Wheel Loader loading a Euclid R27 or R30.