Sad news of the death of popular mineral processor Dan Alexander

We had some extremely sad news this morning of the sudden passing on Wednesday of Dr. Dan Alexander, a very popular figure who will be well known to many in our profession. He was only 48 years old.

Dan was Head of Technology Development at Anglo American, UK. Prior to that he was with the JKTech in Australia for over 14 years, from 2000-2015, where he was initially Operations Manager, and latterly CEO for 5 years.

He was a good friend of all of us at MEI, and a regular at MEI Conferences, particularly flotation, where he attended all but one of the conferences in the series. 

Dan (2nd left) at Flotation '09, with other well known mineral processors who had attended all MEI's flotation series:
Graeme Jameson, Jim Finch, Antonio Peres, Stephen Neethling and Dee Bradshaw

Last year he was also in Falmouth, for Physical Separation '19, and in the photo below he is with his close friend Dr. Ben Adair, CEO and Managing Director of CRC Ore, Australia, and a former Director of the JKMRC.

Ben and Dan in Falmouth

Dan relaxing with John Willis, of SRK Consulting at Physical Separation '19

Ben writes "Dan often spoke fondly and thought very highly of MEI and the conferences you run. We loved being at the The Falmouth conference last year - it was a real highlight for both of us.

Dan was not only a very gifted mineral processor in his own right, but he also had an outstanding vision of the future directions needed for step change in energy, water, and productivity in the industry. 

He was the author and main advocate for Anglo American’s Concentrating the Mine innovation initiatives. No one agitated more for change and a more sustainable future for mining going forward. He was also, of course deeply committed to his wife Suzi and their young son James. A true family man in every sense of the word.

I lost one of my closest friends yesterday, but I also know his loss will be keenly felt by so many of our colleagues. He was also a true friend of MEI. Thank you for thinking of him and any tributes you give him will be deeply appreciated by all his friends".

We will deeply miss Dan, not only for stimulating discussion on mineral processing, but for his views on subjects outside our industry, particularly cricket, which he played at a high level in Australia. 

Our thoughts are very much with his family at this difficult time.