Petrified Forest National Park and Uranium Mining

Above, the entrance sign to Petrified Forest National Park. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

Uranium mining had been a big industry in and around the Four Corners region in the Southwest U.S. since World War II. Other minerals were also mined.

Surprisingly, the areas mined included Petrified Forest National Park in northern Arizona.

Arizona Daily Star has posted an article on uranium and mineral mining in and around the park.

Some snippets:

Petrified Forest National Park, 18 miles southeast of Holbrook, is world-renowned for its petrified wood deposits, but much less known for its mining history and potash deposits.

The area is located on the lower part of the Chinle formation in the Holbrook Basin, which once hosted a tropical climate covered in a dense forest of coniferous trees exceeding 8 feet in diameter and 150 feet tall, 225 million years ago. Over time these fallen trees were covered by river sediment and volcanic ash with high silica concentrate, forming petrified wood.

The area was explored and actively mined for uranium after World War II due to demand from the U.S. military for fissionable materials.

Navajo prospector Charlie Huskon, employed in the service of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), discovered uranium in a sandstone bed near Cameron in 1952. Similar rock formations in the vicinity of Winslow, Holbrook, Joseph City and around the Petrified Forest National Monument showed promising uranium deposits.  

It was the Petrified Forest area comprising eight properties of ore grade material that produced the most uranium for market.

Above, soil layers known as paleosols appears as horizontal colored bands in the Painted Desert. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

To read the full article, go here.