Power Shovel at the Rock Face

About this drawing

A mining power shovel is one of the largest machines that work on land. Its bucket can scoop enough material in one bite to fill a small truck, and it spends its days digging blasted rock and loading the giant haul trucks of open-pit mines.

Its ancestors were the steam shovels of the 1800s. Running on rails, these machines made huge projects possible, like the Panama Canal, where dozens of American steam shovels worked for years carving a path between two oceans.

Many of today's big shovels run on electricity. Instead of a fuel tank, they plug into the mine's power grid through an incredibly long cable. The bucket hangs from steel ropes that wind on and off big drums, much like a crane.

Because they are so big, they come with stairs, walkways and railings like a building, and the operator sits in a raised cab facing the rock wall. With good maintenance, a shovel can run day and night for decades. Some retired shovels have become landmarks. In southeastern Kansas, a giant electric shovel that once dug coal now stands as a museum, and visitors can climb up to see how small people look beside it.

• power shovel
• mining
• excavator
• rocks
• history