El Salvador is a

mining Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the Earth, usually from an ore body, lode, vein, seam, reef, or placer deposit. The exploitation of these deposits for raw material is based on the economic via ...

town A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in different parts of the world. Origin and use The word "town" shares an ori ...

in the commune of

Diego de Almagro Diego de Almagro (; – July 8, 1538), also known as El Adelantado and El Viejo, was a Spanish conquistador known for his exploits in western South America. He participated with Francisco Pizarro in the Spanish conquest of Peru. While sub ...

Chañaral Province Chañaral Province ( es, Provincia de Chañaral) is one of three Provinces of Chile, provinces in the northern Chilean Regions of Chile, region of Atacama Region, Atacama (III). Its capital is the small coastal town of Chañaral. Geography and de ...

, Atacama Region,

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

. Located at an elevation of more than 2,400 meters in the foothills of the

Andes The Andes, Andes Mountains or Andean Mountains (; ) are the longest continental mountain range in the world, forming a continuous highland along the western edge of South America. The range is long, wide (widest between 18°S – 20°S ...

and in the middle of the

Atacama Desert The Atacama Desert ( es, Desierto de Atacama) is a desert plateau in South America covering a 1,600 km (990 mi) strip of land on the Pacific coast, west of the Andes Mountains. The Atacama Desert is the driest nonpolar desert in the ...

, it has a population of approximately 7,000 inhabitants. At its peak, El Salvador once had a population of 34,000 inhabitants.

Development and economy

El Salvador's economy is entirely based on copper mining. The Atacameños extracted copper from this area for more than a thousand years. Nevertheless, it was

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

explorations in the 1950s that revealed the presence of ore that could be exploited in an industrial scale.

Anaconda Copper Mining Company The Anaconda Copper Mining Company, known as the Amalgamated Copper Company between 1899 to 1915, was an American mining company headquartered in Butte, Montana. It was one of the largest trusts of the early 20th century and one of the largest mi ...

was concerned about declining reserves in its Potrerillos mine and it sent prospectors in search of a new Chilean ore body in 1951. Working under the auspices Anaconda's Andes Mining subsidiary, the mineralization was discovered in 1954 and mapped in 1955. As a remote discovery, Anaconda had to build El Salvador as a self-contained and self-sustaining town. It was complete with housing, schools, stores, water and electrical plants and a railway. The mine opened in 1959. The architect in charge of designing the city was Raymond Olson, who worked at the Anaconda headquarters in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. The town was designed in the shape of a Roman helmet. Legend has it that an executive of Anaconda Mining Company travelled to the proposed town site with his son. The boy had with him his beloved toy; a Roman helmet, which he lost in the desert. Years later once the city was built he was flown over the town and his father said “Remember the toy helmet you lost as a young boy? Look down son, there it is

Key dates for the foundation of El Salvador include: * 23 April 1959 - on this date, the first load of ore was crushed. * 2 July 1959 - the first bar of copper arrived in New York. * 28 November 1959 - El Salvador was officially inaugurated. In 1971, after Chilean nationalization of copper, nationalization of copper under the government of

Salvador Allende Salvador Guillermo Allende Gossens (, , ; 26 June 1908 – 11 September 1973) was a Chilean physician and socialist politician who served as the 28th president of Chile from 3 November 1970 until his death on 11 September 1973. He was the fir ...

Codelco Codelco (''Corporación Nacional'' ''del'' ''Cobre de Chile'' or, in English, the National Copper Corporation of Chile) is a Chilean state-owned copper mining company. It was formed in 1976 from foreign-owned copper companies that were nationali ...

Chile took over operation of the El Salvador mine. In 2004, according to official numbers, a total of 74,874 tons metric of fine copper were produced, employing 1,727 people. Nevertheless, since 2001, and in spite of sustained increases in the international price of copper, the mine has experienced losses of more than 3.4 million dollars. In addition, a study by the

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

n consultant Goldberg, determined that only 243 million tons of copper remain in the mine, which assures mineral for only a few years. On July 29, 2005 Codelco announced the planned closure of the mine beginning in 2008. Beginning in that year oxide production will cease, and later, sulfide production from the underground mine. It was expected that the townsite would be closed in 2011. However, it is still inhabited as of 2020, with an indefinite closure date. The Salvador Solar Park is located approximately 5 kilometres south of El Salvador. This 70 MW facility was commissioned in November 2014.

Sports

El Salvador is represented by

Cobresal Club de Deportes Cobresal or simply Cobresal, is a Chilean football club based in El Salvador, Atacama, a Chilean mining camp, and participates in Campeonato Nacional. The team was founded on 5 May 1979, and the name of the club comes from the ...

in the Chilean Football League. Its stadium, Copper Stadium, was inaugurated in 1980. After expansion to accommodate spectators when Cobresal successfully competed in the Chilean League's Premier B finals in 1983, it had a total capacity of 20,752 spectators, that is to say, almost three times the population of the town.

References

External links

Photos (2004)
{{Coord, 26, 15, S, 69, 37, W, display=title, region:CL_type:city_source:GNS-enwiki Communes of Chile Mining communities in Chile Populated places in Chañaral Province Anaconda Copper

Development and economy

Sports

See also

References

External links