Gold dredge vanishes in northern California
Copyright © 2003 Nando Media
Copyright © 2003 Scripps Howard News Service
Sacramento Bee
Sacramento Bee
MARYSVILLE, Calif. (January 28, 9:37 a.m. AST) - A huge gold dredge sank under mysterious
circumstances in the Yuba Goldfields early this week, owners reported.
Yuba Dredge No. 21 disappeared while unattended sometime early Monday morning, said Tony
Massey, general manager of Cal Sierra Development.
Built in 1937, the dredge was 500 feet long and 68 feet wide, with a superstructure towering 110
feet in the air, Massey said.
It was one of only two such gold dredges, basically a large, flat-bottomed barge that uses giant,
jawlike grabbers to scoop up material from the bottom of dredger ponds and dump it into a
conveyor-processor that sorts, separate and sifts out small amounts of remainder gold.
It had been undergoing major repairs for about a year and was scheduled to go back into
operation Tuesday, but vanished instead, leaving nothing behind but a small oil spill. |
