From a Tailings Accident to an Ecological Disaster: Copper Mining in the Aconcagua Valley, Chile

This article reconstructs the history of copper waste throughout the twentieth century in the Aconcagua Valley, Chile. Using the El Cobre disaster of 1965 as a starting point, it explores the deep environmental transformation and conflicts that involved the company (Disputada de las Condes), other small mines, local communities, and public authorities before, during, and after the tragedy. Using state documents available at Chile’s National Archive, newspapers and magazines, technical and engineering reports, theses, and published personal accounts and testimonies, it argues that the disaster is better understood as part of a much larger ecological crisis that included the tailings but also the smelter’s toxic fumes and heavy metal contamination. This multifaceted crisis highlights the violence of mining activities, from its everyday risks and harms to its most extreme manifestation in ecological disaster.