First Place Eludes Alrosa's Mir-Plan Contest

RAPAPORT... Alrosa failed to choose a first-place winner in itscompetition to establish a working plan for resuming operations at its Mirmine, the company said Friday. The Russian miner, which suspended activity at theunderground asset in August of last year following a flood that claimed eightlives, announced the contest this past January. Of the 33 entrants, 10 made itto the final stage and presented their solutions to acommittee headed by Igor Sobolev, Alrosa's first deputy CEO and executivedirector. "In the opinion of the committee, the proposed solutions arethe most acceptable from the viewpoint of safety [in resuming miningoperations] on the Mir pipe, and are the least expensive," said AndreyCherepnov, Alrosa's chief engineer. "At the same time, none of the proposedsolutions can be considered exhaustive - that is, solving [the] problem as awhole. As such, we did not award [a] first place." In second place, Alrosa employees A.A. Korovenkov and R.A.Zakharov tied with the Yakutniproalmaz Institute's A.N. Akishev and V.V.Lobanov. Each of those teams will receive an award of $17,489 (RUB 1 million).Third place went to a group of representatives from several organizations, earningthem a payout of $8,744 (RUB 500,000). The miner evaluated the entries based on several factors,including their scientific and technical validity, their compliance withindustrial safety requirements for mining operations, and their feasibility,economic efficiency and completeness. Alrosa plans to bring together all three winning proposals inorder to formulate a single workable concept for reopening the mine, Cherepnovsaid.