Cripple Creek & Victor open-pit
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Location | |
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Location |
Teller County, near Cripple Creek and Victor |
State | Colorado |
Country | United States |
Coordinates | 38°43′38″N 105°08′40″W / 38.72722°N 105.14444°WCoordinates: 38°43′38″N 105°08′40″W / 38.72722°N 105.14444°W |
History | |
Opened | 1892 |
Owner | |
Company | Newmont Mining Corporation |
Website | Newmont Mining website |
The Cripple Creek & Victor Gold Mine, formerly and historically the Cresson Mine, is an active gold mine located near the town of Victor, in the Cripple Creek mining district in the US state of Colorado. It is the largest current producer of gold in Colorado, and produced 211,000 troy ounces of gold in 2014. It was fully owned and operated by AngloGold Ashanti through its subsidiary, the Cripple Creek & Victor Gold Mining Company (CC&V). In June 2015, AngloGold agreed to sell the mine to Newmont Mining Corporation. The purchase by Newmont was completed in August 2015.
The mine is an open pit operation. The gold is recovered from the ore by heap leaching. CC&V's heap leach pad is one of the biggest in the world.
The mine has a visitor center with displays about modern mining procedures, historical photos, ore and core samples, and mineral uses. Visitors can tour the mine with advance reservation through the Victor Lowell Thomas Museum in Victor, Colorado.
The ore is in altered and brecciated volcanic and volcanoclastic rocks of Oligocene age and predominantly quartz latite composition. The Cripple Creek volcanic complex is surrounded by Precambrian gneiss, granite, and quartz monzonite. The gold occurs as disseminated micrometre-size free gold and as gold-silver tellurides, or telluride minerals. Gangue minerals include pyrite, quartz, and fluorite.