Tungsten, Northwest Territories
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The townsite of Tungsten (shown as Cantung on some maps) is located at
Cantung Mine Cantung Mine is a tungsten producer in the Nahanni area of the Northwest Territories, Canada, located northeast of Watson Lake in the Flat River Valley of the Selwyn Range close to the Yukon border. Tungsten was originally discovered in the ar ...
in the
Northwest Territories The Northwest Territories (abbreviated ''NT'' or ''NWT''; french: Territoires du Nord-Ouest, formerly ''North-Western Territory'' and ''North-West Territories'' and namely shortened as ''Northwest Territory'') is a federal territory of Canada. ...
. It is accessible from Watson Lake,
Yukon Yukon (; ; formerly called Yukon Territory and also referred to as the Yukon) is the smallest and westernmost of Canada's three territories. It also is the second-least populated province or territory in Canada, with a population of 43,964 as ...
via the Nahanni Range Road


History

Tungsten was built in 1961 and the
tungsten Tungsten, or wolfram, is a chemical element with the symbol W and atomic number 74. Tungsten is a rare metal found naturally on Earth almost exclusively as compounds with other elements. It was identified as a new element in 1781 and first isolat ...
mine went into operation in 1962 as a large
open-pit mine Open-pit mining, also known as open-cast or open-cut mining and in larger contexts mega-mining, is a surface mining technique of extracting rock (geology), rock or minerals from the earth from an open-air pit, sometimes known as a Borrow pit, b ...
in the
Mackenzie Mountains The Mackenzie Mountains are a Canadian mountain range forming part of the Yukon- Northwest Territories boundary between the Liard and Peel rivers. The range is named in honour of Canada's second prime minister, Alexander Mackenzie. Nahanni Na ...
. It originally consisted of several small
bungalow A bungalow is a small house or cottage that is either single-story or has a second story built into a sloping roof (usually with dormer windows), and may be surrounded by wide verandas. The first house in England that was classified as a b ...
houses. Total population of Tungsten during the 1960s was approximately 120 persons, including about 27 families. In 1968 families were housed in 28 units (single and duplex housing). Because of extremely good wages and benefits, turnover rates for the entire operation were quite low. Families benefited from the K-8 Grade school, and later a K-9 system. During the summer months, because of the open pit operation, manpower and townsite population grew to 160. In the mid-1970s, the townsite expanded to include a trailer court, three condominiums, bunkhouse trailers, and in 1982, a modern recreation complex. An 80-man bunkhouse was added in 1983. The town and mine were serviced by an all-weather
road A road is a linear way for the conveyance of traffic that mostly has an improved surface for use by vehicles (motorized and non-motorized) and pedestrians. Unlike streets, the main function of roads is transportation. There are many types of ...
to Watson Lake and the, still open,
Tungsten (Cantung) Airport Tungsten (Cantung) Airport serves the Cantung Mine and is located near Tungsten, Northwest Territories The Northwest Territories (abbreviated ''NT'' or ''NWT''; french: Territoires du Nord-Ouest, formerly ''North-Western Territory'' and ''No ...
, with a single runway measuring . In 1979 the estimated population had reached 506, of whom 200 were employees. By the fall of 1982, there were 450 residents and about 100 children were enrolled at Tungsten School. The community also had a public telephone exchange operated by
Northwestel Northwestel Inc. (stylized as NorthwesTel) is a Canadian telecommunications company that is the incumbent local exchange carrier (ILEC) and long-distance carrier in the territories of Yukon, the Northwest Territories, and Nunavut. Originally est ...
: area code 403, prefix 777. By 1986, it was estimated that only 280 people were living at Tungsten. The
Cantung Mine Cantung Mine is a tungsten producer in the Nahanni area of the Northwest Territories, Canada, located northeast of Watson Lake in the Flat River Valley of the Selwyn Range close to the Yukon border. Tungsten was originally discovered in the ar ...
closed in May 1986, and the townsite was closed. A year or two later, the telephone exchange, with only a handful of active lines on obsolescent electromechanical equipment, was shut down. Although the mine reopened in 2002, the nature of the mine had changed so that there was no longer an operating townsite with families. The mine closed again in 2003. Following an investment by the Yukon based Kaska Dena Council in December 2004 the mine was reopened in 2005. The original bungalow houses remain to this day, along with the school, and stand as a monument to a time when town life was busy with local residents.


Geography

The community had the distinction of being the only place in the Northwest Territories that was on
Pacific Time The Pacific Time Zone (PT) is a time zone encompassing parts of western Canada, the western United States, and western Mexico. Places in this zone observe standard time by subtracting eight hours from Coordinated Universal Time ( UTC−08:00). ...
(used in Yukon) rather than
Mountain Time The Mountain Time Zone of North America keeps time by subtracting seven hours from Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) when standard time ( UTC−07:00) is in effect, and by subtracting six hours during daylight saving time ( UTC−06:00). The cloc ...
.


Climate

Tungsten has a
subarctic climate The subarctic climate (also called subpolar climate, or boreal climate) is a climate with long, cold (often very cold) winters, and short, warm to cool summers. It is found on large landmasses, often away from the moderating effects of an ocean, ge ...
( Dfc) with long, severely cold winters and short but mild and rainy summers.


See also

*
Mactung mine The Mactung Project is a planned open pit tungsten mine located in the Selwyn Mountains of eastern Yukon, Canada, on its border with the Northwest Territories The Northwest Territories (abbreviated ''NT'' or ''NWT''; french: Territoires du N ...


References


External links


North American Tungsten
Ghost towns in the Northwest Territories Mining communities in the Northwest Territories {{Canada-ghost-town-stub