From the Black Hills Pioneer, Aug. 21, 2021: The former Homestake Gold Mine in Lead, SD was dedicated as the M. Michael Rounds Operations Center at the Sanford Underground Research Facility. The dedication event included remarks from many dignitaries including Sanford Lab Executive Director Mike Headley, who talked about the long journey it has been to support the new facility and that Sanford Lab has made great strides toward building the LBNF that will house the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment at 4,850 level, led by Fermilab.
Sanford Underground Research Facility
How do you build a ship in a bottle? Everything necessary to construct the enormous Fermilab-hosted international Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment must fit down a narrow, mile-deep shaft cut through solid rock. Contractors have started the months-long process of disassembling excavation equipment and lowering it underground.
Fermilab contractors have successfully commissioned a system that will move 800,000 tons of rock to create space for the international Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment’s detectors in South Dakota. Excavation crews will transport the rock from a mile underground to the surface using refurbished mining infrastructure and the newly constructed conveyor system.
From Construction and Engineering, March 16, 2021: A construction and engineering short view on the development of DUNE and the impressive engineering and excavation process involving hundreds of thousands of tons of rock almost a mile below the surface.
From Público, Nov. 24, 2020: Homestake fue la mayor y más profunda mina de oro de de Norteamérica hasta que se cerró en 2002 tras 125 años de funcionamiento. Este remoto lugar de Dakota del Sur se convirtió oficialmente en 2007 en un laboratorio subterráneo de física fundamental, aunque ya mucho antes se habían instalado en sus profundas cavernas algunos experimentos, incluido uno que mereció el premio Nobel. Ahora se anuncia la nueva etapa para convertir la mina en sede del megaproyecto científico más importante de las últimas décadas en Estados Unidos, el Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility, dedicado a estudiar las partículas fundamentales llamadas neutrinos.