Кривий Ріг шахта

Rodina Mine - Kryvyi Rih Mine

Useful Information

Location:	Mahnitohorska St, Kryvyi Rih, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, 50000. (47.961839, 33.411051)
Open:	Only by reservation at least 7 days in advance. Currently closed. [2023]
Fee:	Currently closed. [2023]
Classification:	Iron Mine
Light:	Incandescent Electric Light System
Dimension:
Guided tours:	D=3 h, Max=4.
Photography:	allowed
Accessibility:	no
Bibliography:	R. Frietsch (1974) The iron ores of the Krivoj Rog area, Ukraine, Soviet Union GFF, 96, 45-52. P. Baranov, S. Shevchenko, W. Heflik, L. Natkaniec-Nowak, M. Dumanska-Slowik (2009): Jaspilite - the gemstone of Ukraine The Journal of Gemmology, Vol. 31, No. 5–8, 163-169.
Address:	Kryvyi Rih Mine, Kryvyi Rih Mine Museum, Mahnitohorska St, Kryvyi Rih, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, 50000.
As far as we know this information was accurate when it was published (see years in brackets), but may have changed since then. Please check rates and details directly with the companies in question if you need more recent info.

History

18th century	Prince Potemkin Tavrichesky initiates first exploration.
1881	beginning of iron ore mining in this area, when a French company establishes the first underground mine called Saksagansky.
1884	Krivbass connected by Donbass by railway.
1955	Soviet Union starts massive development, in ten years six new mines were opened.
JUL-1972	Rodina Mine opened by the Karl Liebknecht Mining Administration.
1980	scandal about high gold content in ores sold to Japan.
1989	mine operated by the "Kryvbasruda" Industrial Association which produced 60% of iron ore needs of the USSR.
1991	mine is operated by PJSC "Kryvyi Rih Iron-Ore Plant".
1997	mine produces 811,000 tons of ore with an iron content of 54.31 %.
2022	Rodina Mine renamed Kryvorizka Mine by the Kryvyi Rih Iron Ore Plant (KZHRK).

Geology

The high grade iron ore has an average iron content of 56,7 %, phosphorus of 0,02 % and sulfur of 0,16 %. The deposit has a dip of 36 to 57°, the thickness varies between 8 m and 110 m, the length is 880 m. The ore minerals are martite, magnetite, hematite, and goethite. Martite is a hematite pseudomorph after magnetite.

The iron ore contains a relevant but very variable amount of iridium, osmium, tungsten, molybdenum, platinum, gold and radioactive elements. Due to their value many western countries bought this iron ore to extract those elements, which are sometimes worth 25-75 times the iron value.

Description

Кривий Ріг шахта (Kryvyi Rih Mine), formerly Шахта Родина (Rodina Mine, Motherland Mine), is an iron ore mine in the mining town Kryvyi Rih. The administration of Kryvyi Rih Iron Ore Plant opened the working mine for an industrial tour which includes the descent into the mine to a depth of 1315 m and 1345 m. The mining technique, machinery and working conditions can be seen first hand. As the area is not visited by many individual tourists, after all it is a mining town and the whole oblast has very few tourist sights, the tours are organized as day trips. Actually the trips are one day overnight trips, as they start with an evening train from Kiev, and return the next day with the evening train to Kiev. Hotel room, breakfast, lunch at a restaurant, and the optional visit of the Kryvyi Rih Aviation Museum are included in the trip. Visiting a still working mine, and even being able to see the actual mining is quite rare and a unique experience, well worth the effort.

The group meets with representatives of Kryvyi Rih Mine for an introduction, an optional medical examination, and a health and safety briefing. The visitors get a miner working outfit, including helmet, headlamp, overall, boots, and self-rescuer. Then the group descends to the 1345 m level and take a mine train for 2 km. From here the group descends on foot to the 1345 m level to the extraction site where the used mining technique and the equipment is presented. There is also the possibility to make pictures. Then the train returns to the station where the ore is unloaded from the trolleys into the mine elevators. The tour end with the change back to your own clothes, it's possible to use the showers of the miners.

The mine is very productive, about 2,6 million tons of high-grade ore are possible, about 1,75 million tons per year with 59,50 % iron are mined. The mining takes place in the levels between 1315 and 1540 m. Due to geological examination, the iron ore reaches at least 1,8 km deep.

The ore contains other metals of varying amount, especially gold and some rare elements. Gold percentage was estimated as non-commercial by the soviet specialists. Nevertheless, the amount changes and the batch which was sold to Japan in 1980 contained rare elements which were worth more than iron ore itself. As a result they stopped the ore supply to Japan. But the people were not happy that the ores were given away without former check.

It's possible to visit the Open Mine Quarry UGOK which has three viewpoints for tourists. It's also possible to descent to the bottom of Quarry UGOK with a Jeep on a special 90 minutes tour. Participants can see excavator EKG-10 (Hitachi) and 130 tons dump truck BelAZ 7513 up close, and observe the loading and unloading of dump trucks. And since November 2013 its possible to visit to the blast furnace №9, metal casting plant and Kryvorizhstal Museum.

The Kryvyi Rih Aviation Museum is very interesting, and you should not skip this tour, even as it is not underground and not mining related. The museum has numerous Russian planes in original, you can see the Tupolev-114, Tupolev-154, Yakovlev-42, Antonov-24, the Helicopter Mi-8 and much more. This museum is quite unique, as it has all important aircraft of the USSR period, airplanes and helicopters of the Tupolev, Antonov, Yakovlev and Mil design bureau.

Before the war there were some problems at the mines, as the miners were on strike for months in 2020. They were dissatisfied with the wages and the working conditions. Also, the state-owned failed to pay the wages for half a year.

The mine is currently still in Ukrainian hands, but it is close to the front and massively influenced by the ongoing war. While Pre-war plans predicted an increase in production by 8.6%, actually it was reduced about 20 %. Also, the operator Kryvyi Rih Iron Ore Plant (KZHRK) renamed the mine to Kryvorizka (Kryvyi Rih) mine. There is a law which prohibits the use of totalitarian regimes’ symbols, and Rodina (Motherland) was a Soviet name, and after the military aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine they are considered a totalitarian regime and all names which originate from the Soviet times are changed.