Steve Axford

Photographer and Sony ambassador. Regularly presents on the science and beauty of fungi.

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  1. The world and the people in it
  2. Volcanoes

Kawa Ijen - Volcano mining

Ijen is an active Volcano in East Java, Indonesia. Kawa Ijen is the active crater of the volcano. The crater has a turquoise acid lake at the bottom, which contrasts starkly with the yellow, sulphur coated rocks of the crater. It is a place of immense beauty, but also the site of a sulphur mine. The workers mine the sulphur from the active fumarole at the bottom of the crater and carry loads of it out of the crater for use in other industries (mainly sugar refining).
As with most mines, mining operations are split into two areas - maintenance/development and production. The production work is generally the highest paid as it is based on actual production; in this case, kilograms of sulphur carried out of the crater. This is backbreaking work, in cruel conditions and the miners get paid IDR 550/kg (US$0.06/kg). This translates to about US$9/day for a top miner. Even this is better than the development work, at least it was on this day.

The fumarole emits a stream of hot gases at about 400 deg C. These gases are a mix of steam, sulphur, sulphur dioxide, hydrogen sulphide and various other, generally nasty gases, but no oxygen. The miners collect the sulphur by directing these gases through iron pipes which allow the elemental sulphur to condense, flow out of the bottoms of the pipes and solidify in areas know as "kitchens". The kitchens are where the sulphur is collected and put into baskets for the production miners to carry out of the mine.

On this day, 29th July 2008, the wind was quite gusty and had filled the crater with toxic gases. It was also a day when the miners needed to do some work to add new pipes to the fumarole. This was done by first trying to cool the fumarole with a hose. I suspect this did very little (have you ever tried cooling a volcano with a garden hose?), but at least they tried. The miners then formed a bucket line to pass up new pipes and buckets of cement to hold them in place. This work had to be done in the very worst location possible - right on top of the fumarole where the heat and gases were at their most extreme. I had a respirator on for the whole time I was in the crater, but even then I could only approach the fumarole with great care and I had to be prepared to retreat at any instant if the wind blew the fumes back towards me. Not even a good respirator will let you breathe when there isn't enough oxygen in the air. Some miners had old respirators (which probably didn't work any more), but most had to rely on breathing through a wet rag held in their mouth. This did help to absorb the gases, but it also forms an acid solution which dissolves their teeth. The work was very slow as any great exertion on the part of the miners was impossible in conditions with so little breathable air. I'll let the photos do the rest of the talking. Footnote: While these photos were taken some time ago, the mine is still operating and the workers still suffer under the same conditions. Tourists, like myself, travel to the crater and marvel at how the workers survive. Then we leave. We never see any old workers. Perhaps they get a retirement benefit and good medical care, but I doubt it. I expect most die young, usually from lung disease.
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Relief.  A miner reaches the top of the crater.  Now he can breathe fresh air and it is all downhill to the weighing station.
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Relief. A miner reaches the top of the crater. Now he can breathe fresh air and it is all downhill to the weighing station.

  • A starkly beautiful scene, but also a place of great pain for the miners who work there.  They either work in the fumes of the fumarole at the bottom, or carry loads of up to 80kg of sulphur out of the crater - or both.  A miner can be seen (bottom left) with a load of about 70kg of sulpur.
  • The best job is carrying the sulphur out of the crater.  It means you have less contact with the fumes, you get paid more (up to $10/day), but you have to carry 50-60kg per load.  Few people can survive that for very many years.
  • Relief.  A miner reaches the top of the crater.  Now he can breathe fresh air and it is all downhill to the weighing station.
  • Nearing the top
  • It's a steep and dangerous path
  • Untitled photo
  • The film maker, the rubber boat and the acid lake.  Peter films George on the lake (George is the speck in the distance).  For more of this and other Ijen scenes see "Angry Planet" on the Travel Channel or the Weather Channel.
  • The fumarole .  The guy at the bottom is collecting sulpur, those on the left are helping the workers lost in the fumes who are repairing the pipes.  There are 3 more workers lost in the fumes.  The guy at the top on the left is the foreman.  He is the only one with a respirator, but I doubt it works as the cartridges should be replaced quite frequently.
  • A break in the smoke reveals the workers on the fumarole.  They are usually lost in the smoke when they have to close their eyes and stay still till the smoke clears.
  • Survival
  • A sulphur miner retrieves a stalagtite of sulphur for sale as a souvenier. The fumes are a mix of sulphur gas and sulphur dioxide. Quite nasty if you get a lungfull. The miners protect themselves by breathing through a wet rag that they hold in their teeth.
  • Choking
  • A hard day.
  • The view from the highest point of the crater rim.  It looked none to stable, so I took a photo and quickly retreated.  A bath in the acid lake below would have been a nasty way to go.
  • Me with mask by the lake
  • Untitled photo
  • Untitled photo
  • Untitled photo
  • A hard life
  • A dead tree at the edge of the crater.  It would have died as the activity of the volcano increased.
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