I was heading back home to Bisbee after a couple days here in Greenlee County tagging peaks. I was driving southbound on US-191 which would take me into Morenci, home of the massive open-pit copper mine, one of the largest in the world.

The highway drops suddenly from the higher elevation mountains and forest into the mine complex, and the change happens fast. The scale is profound. Entire mountains have been blasted down and carted away. The tiers where the blasting has taken place rise over 2,000 feet from top to bottom.

I stopped at an overlook, where one can look down into the operations. It's alike a small city down there. The buidlings are not temporary but huge multi-story things. The trucks hauling rock ore are as big as a two-story house. They were rumbling by, the ones full of rock going yay, and the empty ones going nyaw.

The overlook includes a small display including an engine, and one of the wheels. These wheels are easily 12 feet tall. I barely come up halfway to one. I would love to drive one of those trucks, even if just for fifty feet on a straight line. It'd be like driving a building.

Down lower in elevation, the winds were stronger and they were kicking up a lot of dust here in the mines. The whole place was under a pall of fine dust. I enjoyed my brief stop, always fascinated by such monstrous operations.

Truck tire. I come up half way and I'm 6-ft, 4 inches tall

Zoom of a truck. That truck is about as big as a two-story house. It can carry hundreds of tons of ore in its hold.

Looking at the commotion one way

And the other. It was very windy today, kicking up all sorts of dust

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