Mining

SALT LAKE CITY — If Utah does not get control over federal lands within its borders, two local lawmakers worry, it could severely impact the state’s economy in the long run.

YREKA, Calif. -- The last time so much gold was pulled out of this town, the place was known as "the richest square mile on earth," a Gold Rush jewel north of California's Mother Lode.

By the mid-1850s, the town so glittered in gold that miners showered the popular child dancer Lotta Crabtree with buckskin bags filled with nuggets at the Arcade Saloon.

Now Yreka is feeling violated by an audacious heist that has stolen its history and wounded its pride.

SALT LAKE CITY — Federal biologists say a strip mine at the backdoor to Utah’s storybook Bryce Canyon National Park will wipe out the southernmost population of sage grouse, even as their agency resists a broader effort to protect the bird across the West.

KAYENTA, Ariz. -- The federal Office of Surface Mining has renewed an operating permit for a northern Arizona coal mine.

MULLAN, Idaho -- Seven miners were pulled from more than a mile below the surface after an accident at a northern Idaho silver mine where two workers died in separate mishaps this year.

FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. -- A group of Republican lawmakers is renewing an effort to open up 1 million acres near the Grand Canyon to new mining claims.

Legislation announced Wednesday would prevent the Interior Department from extending a temporary ban on the filing of new mining claims that expires in December. The group said Interior Secretary Ken Salazar's intention to set aside the land for 20 years would eliminate hundreds of potential jobs, create a de facto wilderness area and unravel decades of responsible resource development.

BONANZA — Local, state and federal officials are investigating an early morning fire near Vernal that destroyed a building at a mining company’s processing plant.