PROCESSING THE PHOSPHATE ORE
Drag lines and Buckets
Wet rock
Processing plants
Ports
DRAG LINES AND BUCKETS
Mulberry, Fl; Museum.
A very small bucket compared to today's standard is shown at the museum.
WET ROCK
Ridgewood, Fl; Valarico Subdivision; July 1997.
Once taken out of the ground the rock is mixed with water to make a
slurry (wet rock) to make it easier to transport to the processing plants.
Here, wet rock is being piled up until further use.
PLANTS
Green Bay, Fl. July 2000.
Typical processing plant in the Bone Valley. Sulfuric and Phosphoric
acid along with the wet rock are brought here by train. The processed rock
(Dry rock) is stored in a big covered hangar (left on the picture) until
loaded onto a train for either Rockport or Port Sutton.
PORTS
ROCKPORT
Rockport, Fl; February 1998.
One of the most impressive piece of equipment used in the port is the
loader. It takes this machine about 24 hours to load phosphate in a sea-going
ship. The other 2 major operations in Rockport are the rotary dumper and
storage shed.
PORT SUTTON
Port Sutton, Fl; July 1997.
The processed rock needs to stay dry so that it does not oxydized and
therefore lose its fertilizing characteristic. It is therefore stored in
these "drying" plants (TECO; top) until loaded onto ships. The phosphate
loader (IMC version; bottom) can be seen at work.
