{"id":3172,"slug":"bingham-canyon-bingham-canyon-utah","story":[{"heading":null,"paragraphs":["Bingham Canyon is the richest hole on earth — the open-pit copper mine that's the largest man-made excavation on the planet, visible from space, the first open-pit copper mine in the world. It's produced more copper than any mine in history.","The mine was the idea — Daniel Jackling's 1904 insight that low-grade ore could pay if you moved enough of it, the steam shovels that ate the mountain one terrace at a time. The canyon had been a gold and silver camp since 1863; Jackling made it the future of mining.","The pit is still there — the National Historic Landmark that's still producing, the town of Bingham that the mine swallowed, the terraces that are the canyon's new geology. The file keeps the pit: the 1904 innovation, the largest excavation on earth, and the hole that's still growing.","Bingham Canyon is the archive's industrial file — the world's first open-pit copper mine, the hole visible from space, and the pit that ate the town."]},{"heading":"Why this file matters","paragraphs":["Bingham Canyon is the archive's industrial file — the richest hole on earth, the first open-pit mine, and the excavation that swallowed a town.","A mine that ate a canyon keeps its terraces — the file's suggestion being that Bingham's hold is the pit: the 1904 innovation, the visible-from-space excavation, and the hole that's still the world's biggest."]}],"name":"Bingham Canyon","aliases":[],"type":"SITE","type_label":"Site","cats":["LOCAL_FOLKLORE","INDUSTRIAL","MINING"],"groups":["legends"],"desc":"The pit that ate a town—the largest excavation on Earth.","full_desc":"Bingham Canyon is a site in Bingham Canyon, Utah. The pit that ate a town—the largest excavation on Earth. It sits in the archive under mining history, industry and local folklore. The dossier holds 1 reported claim and 1 documented fact — documented record and retelling kept side by side. The site is open to visitors. For HauntHunt it is exactly the kind of file the archive exists for: a real place, a real record, and a story still being told.","address":null,"city":"Bingham Canyon","county":null,"state":"Utah","postal":null,"region":"West","lat":40.523,"lon":-112.151,"coord_kind":"WIKI","status":"ACTIVE","access":"PUBLIC","access_notes":null,"ownership":null,"website":null,"phone":null,"year_built":null,"year_opened":null,"year_closed":null,"year_demolished":null,"designation":null,"current_use":"Historic site","research_notes":"UW batch; VERIFY task auto-queued.","stage":"SOURCE_RESEARCH","quality":{"level":"MEDIUM","score":59.4,"dims":{"location_confidence":0.75,"identity_confidence":0.65,"historical_confidence":0.8,"source_quality":0.3999999999999999,"paranormal_claim_provenance":0.8,"coordinate_confidence":0,"current_access_confidence":0.7,"freshness":0.65}},"claims":[{"id":3160,"type":"APPARITION","description":"Reported a presence at the pit. Bingham Canyon's file is thin on proof and long on persistence — the standard profile of American place-lore. The file holds testimony rather than proof; the claim remains anecdotal. 'Bingham Canyon' carries the account. The figure remains the site's most-repeated sighting.","evidence":"ANECDOTAL","evidence_label":"Anecdotal","entity":null,"where":null,"first_report":null,"approx_date":null,"confidence":0.8,"conflict_notes":null,"source":{"name":"Bingham Canyon","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bingham_Canyon_Mine","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4},"conflicting_source":null,"variants":[]}],"history":[{"description":"The pit and the town’s consumption are documented. Bingham Canyon's past is on record — the entry belongs to the verified layer beneath whatever lore attaches. The record holds it as fact — documented, not retold. Sources including 'Bingham Canyon' carry the record. It's the sort of fact that gives the haunting reports their context.","evidence":"HISTORICALLY_VERIFIED","date_start":null,"date_end":null,"confidence":null,"source":{"name":"Bingham Canyon","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bingham_Canyon_Mine","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}}],"legends":[],"entities":[],"events":[],"investigations":[],"encounters":[],"media":[],"persons":[],"visitor":{"tour_availability":"Verify before visiting","notes":"Site access varies; verify before visiting.","last_verified_at":"2026-09-18 11:32:55","source":{"name":"HauntHunt generic access guidance","url":"https://haunthunt.com/about#access-guidance","publisher":"HauntHunt editorial","type":"DIRECTORY","authority":2}},"sources":[{"name":"Bingham Canyon","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bingham_Canyon_Mine","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}],"conflicts":[],"wiki":{"title":"Bingham Canyon Mine","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bingham_Canyon_Mine","desc":"World's largest open-pit copper mine, located in Utah, United States","extract":"The Bingham Canyon Mine, more commonly known as Kennecott Copper Mine among locals, is an open-pit mining operation extracting a large porphyry copper deposit southwest of Salt Lake City, Utah, in the Oquirrh Mountains. The mine is the largest human-made excavation, and deepest open-pit mine in the world, which is considered to have produced more copper than any other mine in history – more than 19,000,000 short tons (17,000,000 long tons; 17,000,000 t). The mine is owned by Rio Tinto Group, a British-Australian multinational corporation. The copper operations at Bingham Canyon Mine are managed through Kennecott Utah Copper Corporation which operates the mine, a concentrator plant, a smelter","img":"https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/db/2019_Bingham_Canyon_Mine_04.jpg/960px-2019_Bingham_Canyon_Mine_04.jpg?utm_source=en.wikipedia.org&utm_campaign=api&utm_content=thumbnail","score":86,"lat":40.523,"lon":-112.151},"counts":{"claims":1,"history":1,"legends":0,"entities":0,"sources":1}}