Big Brutus is the nickname of the

Bucyrus-Erie Bucyrus-Erie was an American surface and underground mining equipment company. It was founded as Bucyrus Foundry and Manufacturing Company in Bucyrus, Ohio, in 1880. Bucyrus moved its headquarters to South Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 1893. In 1927, B ...

model 1850-B electric

shovel A shovel is a tool used for digging, lifting, and moving bulk materials, such as soil, coal, gravel, snow, sand, or ore. Most shovels are hand tools consisting of a broad blade fixed to a medium-length handle. Shovel blades are usually made of ...

, which was the second largest of its type in operation in the 1960s and 1970s. Big Brutus is the centerpiece of a mining museum in

West Mineral, Kansas West Mineral is a city in Cherokee County, Kansas, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population of the city was 154. It is the home of Big Brutus, the second largest electric shovel in the world. History West Mineral was named from t ...

, United States where it was used in coal

strip mining Surface mining, including strip mining, open-pit mining and mountaintop removal mining, is a broad category of mining in which soil and rock overlying the mineral deposit (the overburden) are removed, in contrast to underground mining, in which ...

operations. The shovel was designed to dig from down to unearth relatively shallow coal seams, which would themselves be mined with smaller equipment.

Description

Fabrication of Big Brutus was completed in May 1963, after which it was shipped on 150 railroad cars to be assembled in Kansas. It operated until 1974, when it became uneconomical to mine coal at the site. At that time it was considered too big to move and was left in place. Big Brutus, while not the largest electric shovel ever built, is the largest electric shovel still in existence. The Captain, at – triple that of Big Brutus – was the largest shovel and one of the largest land-based mobile machines ever built, only exceeded by some

dragline A dragline excavator is a piece of heavy equipment used in civil engineering and surface mining. Draglines fall into two broad categories: those that are based on standard, lifting cranes, and the heavy units which have to be built on-site. ...

and

bucket-wheel excavator A bucket-wheel excavator (BWE) is a large heavy equipment machine used in surface mining. The primary function of BWEs is ...

s. It was scrapped in 1992, after receiving extreme damage from an hours-long internal fire.

Museum

The Pittsburg & Midway Coal Mining Company donated Big Brutus in 1984 as the core of a mining museum which opened in 1985. In 1987, the

American Society of Mechanical Engineers The American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) is an American professional association that, in its own words, "promotes the art, science, and practice of multidisciplinary engineering and allied sciences around the globe" via "continuing ...

designated Big Brutus a Regional Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmark. It was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

in 2018. The museum offers tours and camping.

Fatal accident

On January 16, 2010, Mark Mosley, a 49-year-old

dentist A dentist, also known as a dental surgeon, is a health care professional who specializes in dentistry (the diagnosis, prevention, management, and treatment of diseases and conditions of the mouth, oral cavity and other aspects of the craniofaci ...

from

Lowell, Arkansas Lowell is a city in Benton County, Arkansas, Benton County, Arkansas, United States. Located within Ozark Mountains, the Ozarks, first settlement was along Old Wire Road in the 1840s, and although destroyed during the Civil War, the community was ...

, died attempting to base-jump from the top of the boom. Climbing the boom had been prohibited years earlier; after the accident, the attraction's board of directors considered additional restrictions on climbing. During the accident's investigation, examiner Tom Dolphin determined that Mosley had accidentally fallen off the boom while preparing to jump.

References

External links

*
Big Brutus, Sept. 1987, The American Society of Mechanical Engineers
Stripping shovels Museums in Cherokee County, Kansas Mining museums in Kansas Mining equipment National Register of Historic Places in Cherokee County, Kansas Bucyrus-Erie {{Industry-stub

Description

Museum

Fatal accident

See also

References

External links