Keweenaw Report Your Source for Local News and Sports
The Empire Mine is now closed.
Operations at the mine in Palmer officially ceased Thursday, meaning some 266 employees still working at the mine will soon be laid off.
In all, around 400 people will be out of work by the end of the month.
Director of Global Communications for Cliffs Natural Resources Patricia Persico says the mine has now moved into an indefinite idle state.
“We will preserve all of the assets for future optionality,” said Patricia Persico, director of Global Communications for Cliffs Natural Resources. “Over the next few months there will be work related to that.”
“We will still maintain our environmental commitments related to the mine area. Right now, we are not going into a full, permanent closure mode,” Persico added.
For the soon–to–be laid off workers, officials at Cliffs say there is an opportunity for some of them to seek employment at another company facility in Minnesota.
“Folks from the Michigan Ops have been interviewing for some open positions, granted we’re not going to be able to place the entire amount of folks impacted.”
The other mine Cliffs owns and operates, the Tilden mine, will continue normal operations.
That mine employs 770 people.
