Wittenoom Gorge is a valley in northwestern Australia. Asbestos was mined there from 1938 to 1966. The Australian mining magnate Lang Hancock found the outcrop of blue asbestos on his father’s property. The mine was sold to the Colonial Sugar Refinery Company (CSR) in 1948. In 1959, after the commissioner of public health in Western Australia reported on the dangers of lung disease faced by the workers because of asbestos dust, better ventilation was installed. The mine was closed in 1966 after it was shown that teachers working inside the local school were being exposed to dangerous dust because leftover asbestos from the mine had been used to build roads in the area. The song “Blue Sky Mine” (1990) by the Australian rock group Midnight Oil describes the hardships of asbestos miners at Wittenoom Gorge.
