Thursday 28 April 2022

Back to our roots in the industrial north

Barbara and I were both born and bred in the industrial north of England, in the cotton-mill town of Ashton-under-Lyne, 6 miles from the centre of Manchester, where we spent a few days last week for a nostalgic visit to the world of our youth. We found that Ashton has changed beyond recognition and appears to have lost its soul, but Manchester is now a dynamic thriving metropolis, where magnificent Victorian and modern architecture blend together in harmony. 

Manchester was the world's first industrialised city, brought on by a boom in textile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution, and it was the world's largest marketplace for cotton goods during the Victorian era. The dystopian city of the 19th century was a hellish place in which to live and work, and the conditions in the noisy, dangerous and unhealthy cotton mills are brought to life in the city's Science and Industry Museum, which is on the site of the world's first passenger railway station, Manchester Liverpool Road, which opened in 1830.

Cotton mill machinery in the Science and Industry Museum

By the mid-19th century Ashton-u-Lyne had emerged as an important mill town at a convergence of newly constructed canals and railways. As Cornwall has its ruined engine houses, so Ashton has its landscape of cotton mills, a reminder of its industrial past.

However, in all my 24 years in Ashton I had never realised its importance as a coal mining town during the industrial revolution, as it lay on the Lancashire coal fields which provided the fuel for the developing industries. Coal mining was not as important to the town as the textile industry, but in 1882 the Ashton Moss Colliery had the deepest mine shaft in the world at 870 metres (2,850 ft), surpassing that of Cornwall's Dolcoath Tin Mine at 660 metres (2160 ft), although Dolcoath eventually reached a depth of 1000 metres (3300 ft) by the end of the century (posting of 3 August 2015).

None of this I knew about in my early life, most of which was spent with my parents and sister in the Ashton Moss Council Estate, only a couple of miles from the Ashton Moss Colliery, then the town's only working coal mine, which eventually closed in 1959. It was known locally as the 'Snipe Pit' and I doubt if many residents now would be aware of its existence, the only reference to Snipe being the name of the retail park which stands on the original mine site, and the nearby pub, the Snipe Inn. Remarkably the deep mine was ventilated by a furnace half way down the pit, supplemented by a boiler fire at the bottom.

Coal was king in 1950s Britain and directly or indirectly fueled our homes. The coal was cheap, low grade and dirty, producing much ash and soot, the airborne particles contaminating buildings and people alike. The Victorian buildings of the industrial north had black facades, highlighting their Gothic gloominess, and it was only in later years, well after the Clean Air act of 1956 that their original sandstone surfaces were restored in all their glory.

Manchester University before and after cleaning
Manchester's Corn Exchange revealed in all its glory

Many homes, including ours, also had stoves and washing tubs fueled by coal gas (town gas). Ashton, like many industrial towns, had its own gas-works, where coal from the numerous collieries was heated to drive off the gas. The gas was collected in large reservoirs, or gasometers, from where it was piped to local industry and houses, and the residue was coke, a clean but expensive fuel.

The burning of coal in homes and industry produced another hazardous side-effect. Northern England is noted for its rainfall, and the subsequent high humidity provided ideal conditions for minimisation of the breakage of threads in the cotton mills. However humidity and cold winters often produce fog, which combined with the coal-contaminated atmosphere, produced that dreaded combination of smoke and fog known as smog, a noxious mix of particulate matter and gases such as sulphur dioxide and nitrogen dioxide. Often a sickly yellow-green colour, these ‘pea-soupers’ would sometimes totally shut down the activities of a town, but I remember vividly walking to and from school when the visibility was an acceptable metre, with car headlights appearing slowly and eerily out of the gloom.  Only towards the end of the 50s did the situation improve, with Clean Air Acts identifying ‘smokeless’ zones, where only smokeless fuels such as anthracite and coke could be burned.

The first four years of my life were spent with my parents and maternal grandparents, latterly in my grandparents back-street general store. Although mum and dad lived at the shop for only a few years, as primary school was only a couple of minutes walk away lunch (dinner!)was spent at the shop for the first few years of my schooling.

With friends at my grandparents shop, November 1949

Cobbled streets, back-yards, outside lavatories; these are some of my most vivid memories of life in the early 50s. The outside lavatory did not have a flushing system, and was operated by a ‘tippler’ system. Waste would remain in an open sewer until the tippler filled with the waste kitchen sink water; it would then tip, sending a couple of gallons of water through the system flushing the waste away. It was counterbalanced at the back so that it returned upright when empty. Using 'grey'water in this way sounds very environmentally friendly, but in reality is wasn't!

A regular visitor to our cobbled back streets was the rag-and-bone man, with his horse and cart rattling over the cobbles. He would collect old rags, for converting into fabric and paper, bones for making glue, scrap iron, old jam jars and other items in return for items of limited value. We children would often trade such items for goldfish and balloons, but the women of the district would eagerly await his supply of much-needed ‘donkey-stones’.

Donkey-stones were soft scouring stones, originally used in the textile mills to provide a non-slip surface on greasy staircases. The stone, which took its name from the hard work performed, was made from pulverised sandstone, cement, bleach powder and water. Working class women had hard lives of drudgery and routine, and the donkey-stoning ritual, which was unique to northern England, was an essential part of their weekly routine. One day of each week would be devoted to going down on hands and knees and donkey-stoning doorsteps, windowsills, the flagged kitchen floor, and most importantly, the paving stones, or ‘flags’, outside their terraced homes. “Sanding the flag” was an ideal occasion for neighbourly gossip, but women were proud of their donkey-stoning, and would feel that anyone whose step was not meticulously sanded would have let the street down.  

'Sanding the flags' in the 1950s

With such an upbringing it is not surprising that Barbara and I have always been avid viewers of the long-running 'soap opera' Coronation Street which has run continuously since 1960. The programme centres around an eponymous cobbled, terraced street in Weatherfield, a fictional town based on inner-city Salford, the home of Granada Studios, which we visited last week to explore the set.

A potential sundowner venue?

Barbara was also brought up in a working class family, the eldest of six children. Her father was a bus-conductor, and collected tickets on one of the local bus routes. One of his regular passengers was a shabbily dressed old man, who he befriended, and occasionally turned a blind eye to collecting his fare. The old man confided that he was a bit of an artist, and offered Barbara's dad one of his paintings, which he politely declined, as he did not wish to take anything in return for his kindness.  Later it was discovered that the old man was one of Manchester’s most famous sons, the artist L.S. Lowry, who died in 1976. His paintings of scenes of life in the industrial districts of northern England during the early 20th century now sell for fortunes, his ‘matchstick men’ figures have often been criticised as being naïve, but a large collection of his work is on permanent public display in a purpose built Manchester art gallery appropriately named The Lowry.

With my sister Pat at the Lowry Exhibition

Barbara and I spent most of our youth and childhood separated by about 2 miles, living unaware of each other until 1962 when we met at the local youth club.

1963: The first of many photos of Barbara and me; Barbara with my sister Pat;
and with friend Tony Marland en route to one of our many parties 

It was great to meet up last week with our oldest friends from that time, Tony and Nora Marland, and Eric and Pat Nield. We had lunch at one of our old watering holes, the Broadoak Hotel, once the site of another of Ashton's coal mines, the Broad Oak, which closed in 1901.

Tony, Pat, Barbara, Eric, Nora and me at the Broadoak Hotel, Ashton

Eric and I were at Grammar School together and were members of the junior football team.

Ashton Grammar Juniors 1958: Eric is back row 2nd left and I am centre, front row

Shortly after this picture was taken a weaselly litle history teacher caught me and others smoking in the showers after a match in Oldham, and, as captain, I was made an example of, and banned from playing football again for the school- I didn't play competitively again until 1967 at Leeds University! But football remained an important part of my life and I was a fanatical supporter of Manchester City, my dad taking me regularly to home fixtures at Maine Road, but indelibly etched in the memories of Mancunians of a certain age is the event of February 6th, 1958.  

I remember dad coming home for "tea" to inform us breathlessly that a plane carrying the Manchester United team had crashed after a European Cup tie, and there were many fatalities. United was, of course, the ‘other’ Manchester team and there was intense rivalry between local supporters. Feelings softened, however, when the whole of Manchester came together after the Munich air disaster, which claimed the lives of eight of the Manchester United team, and during the early sixties Barbara and our friends and I would often drop in at Old Trafford of an evening to watch the legendary threesome, George Best, Bobby Charlton (one of the survivors of the crash) and Denis Law in action. It is well over 50 years since I was last at the ground, so it was good to make a brief visit last week.

Another vivid memory is of a night at the youth club in late 1962, where the place was buzzing and the chatter was all about a new group from Liverpool which had been on local TV that night. They were called The Beatles and they had an immediate impact on us all and played a big part in our lives in the 60s, and we have been great fans ever since. Until last week I had only ever visited Liverpool once, for interview at the University in 1963 (I opted for Leeds), so we took the  train last week from Manchester to Liverpool Lime Street, for a 'Magical Mystery Tour' of the city.

It was a great week of nostalgia, and I would very much like to hear from you if you were also part of the industrial scene in the middle of last century.

@barrywills

Monday 25 April 2022

New book: Mine Wastes and Water, Ecological Engineering and Metals Extraction

This recently published book, edited by Margarete Kalin-Seidenfaden and William N. Wheeler, reviews past and present mine waste management processes. It estimates global water consumption by major mining resources per annum. This consumption will lead land use resources (agriculture and water) to collide with mining interests in the near future. With the application of novel metal extraction processes and the adoption of ecological engineering as an approach to waste and water management, a reduction in water and land consumption can be achieved. Using these methodologies would make mining more sustainable. Together with ore and metal recycling, mining methods can be brought into the 21st century.

The book describes natural weathering processes and the microbiology of extreme environments, such as mine sites. The role of microbes in weathering and remediation is emphasized, along with case studies of the enhancement of various ecological processes which curtail weathering and transform pollutants, creating ore bodies of the future.

This book has been written as an extension to a contribution to the Oxford Research Encyclopedia. It adds depth and many examples from 40 years of multidisciplinary work with experts from geology, hydrogeology, geomicrobiology and algal physiology and chemistry, items too extensive for the Encyclopedia.

We hope to hear more of these topics at Sustainable Minerals '22 in July. The deadline for abstracts for this online conference is the end of this week

Thursday 21 April 2022

Sustainable Minerals '22: Final Call for Abstracts

The rapid growth of the world economy is straining the sustainable use of the Earth’s natural resources due to modern society’s extensive use of metals, materials and products. An astute and conscious application and use of metals, materials and products supported by the reuse and recycling of these materials and end-of-life products is imperative to the preservation of the Earth’s resources. The realisation of the ambitions of sustainable use of metals, materials and resources demands that the different disciplines of the material and consumer product system are connected and harmonised and MEI's Sustainable Minerals '22 in July will discuss all aspects of material and metal usage. 

There is now a final call for abstracts for the conference, which should be submitted by the end of this month.  We are indebted to the support of our sponsors, ZEISS, Metso Outotec, Hudbay Minerals, Weir Minerals and Promet101, our media partner International Mining, and our Industry Advocates the Coalition for Eco-Efficient Comminution (CEEC), the Cornwall Mining Alliance and the Critical Minerals Association.

#SustainableMinerals22

Monday 18 April 2022

Looking to the future : Physical Separation in 2030

Next month's Physical Separation '22, the 7th in the MEI series, and the first to be totally online, has a fine programme, covering gravity and magnetic separation, sorting and microwaves, classification and solid-liquid separation, and a highlight on the final session of day 3, a live panel discussion on the future of physical separation.

The scheduled 2-hour session will be chaired by Dr. Erin Bobicki of the University of Toronto, Canada, who will also be co-authoring work on the application of microwave imaging in sensor-based ore sorting on day 2 of the conference. Sensor-based sorting is rapidly developing into a major method of pre-concentration and representing conference sponsor Steinert on the panel will be Dr. Priscila Esteves, of Steinert Latinoamericana, Brazil. Priscila will also be presenting a paper on the development of a sensor-based sorting application for iron ore concentration, as well as co-authoring a presentation on sensor-based sorting technology to separate chromite lump from low grade rocks.

Prof. Neil Rowson, Emeritus Professor at the University of Birmingham and Laboratory Manager at Bunting-Redditch, UK, will be giving a keynote lecture at the conference on the role of magnetic separation in the development of critical and strategic metal recovery flowsheets, and will be the magnetic separation specialist on the panel.

Prof. Kevin Galvin, Laureate Professor at the University of Newcastle, Australia, is also a keynote speaker at the conference, his lecture being on new challenges for gravity concentration and classification of fine particles. Kevin is the inventor of the Reflux Classifier used in gravity separation of fine particles. With over 180 installations around the world, the technology has been used to beneficiate coal, iron ore, mineral sands, potash, chromite, and other base metal oxides. New innovative systems are emerging including the Graviton and the Reflux Flotation Cell through collaboration with FLSmidth. He has also been developing a novel agglomeration technology with Jord International. Among his many honours he has been the recipient of the SME's prestigious Antoine Gaudin Award.

Dr. Peter Amelunxen, of conference sponsor Hudbay Minerals, Canada, is an all-round mineral processor who chaired the panel discussion at last year's Flotation '21. He was the first recipient of MEI's Young Person's Award in 2011 and it is good to have him with us again on the panel.

There is no doubt that interesting things will come out of this panel discussion, as the panelists answer questions put to them by the delegates. The live presentation will also be recorded and available on demand after the conference.

#PhysicalSeparation22

Friday 15 April 2022

April Cornish Mining Sundowner with good news of tin and lithium mining in Cornwall

There was a good turn-out last night at Falmouth's Chain Locker for the April Mining Sundowner with a few new faces swelling the ranks of the regulars.

Three of the "regulars" Dean Eastbury, Pete Shepherd and Steve Barber
CSM mining and geology students making their sundowner debuts

I was pleased to see Andy Wilkinson, a 1991 CSM mineral processing graduate, now with Metso-Outotec, a sponsor of MEI's forthcoming Comminution '23 and Flotation '23. Andy was accompanied by his Ukrainian fiancée Iryna Shopska who has only recently joined him in St. Austell. Although Iryna enjoys living in Cornwall her thoughts were very much on her family and friends in her war-torn country.

With Andy and Iryna

Mining ventures continue to push ahead in Cornwall and it was good to hear that Cornish Metals Inc. plans to raise up to £40.5 million via a share issue to advance its development of South Crofty tin mine. The mining company has secured a £25 million strategic investment from Vision Blue Resources, a vehicle founded by former Xstrata plc boss Mick Davis. In addition, Cornish Metals plans to raise a further £15.5 million from a private placing and subscription. The money will be used for mine dewatering, resource drilling, completion of a feasibility study, evaluation of further downstream opportunities, and early works in advance of a potential construction decision.

Demand for tin is expected to grow rapidly as it is essential for the high-tech, low carbon economy, which makes South Crofty a strategic asset with the ability to provide a secure, traceable, sustainable supply of this important metal. Tin is primarily used in the production of lead-free solder used in almost all circuit boards and semiconductors, as well as renewable energy systems where tin is used in the production of photo voltaic cells, and there is growing demand from the automotive sector where it is utilised in EV components and has been shown to enhance the performance of EV batteries themselves. At the same time there is no primary mine production of tin in Europe or North America and the metal has been designated as a mineral critical to economic and national security by the USA. 

South Crofty has one of the highest grade tin mineral resources in the world not currently in production and has the potential to be among the lowest cost producers globally. Having previously operated until 1998, there is significant mine infrastructure still in place, most notably several mine shafts that can be used for future production and ventilation purposes, and the operation is located within an industrial area with access to the national electricity grid as well as existing transport infrastructure. 

Braving the elements outside the pub were members of Cornish Lithium and Geoscience, who are much involved in the development of extraction of lithium from deep and hot geothermal brines. Second left is Cornish Lithium's ESG & Sustainability Manager Lucy Crane and standing is Pete Ledingham, a founding member of Geoscience, which he joined following six years at the Camborne School of Mines Hot Dry Rock geothermal research project. He was Project Manager of the United Downs Deep Geothermal Power project from its inception until May 2020. 

It is well known that lithium is critical to electric vehicle battery manufacture and the UK government has been warned it is falling dangerously behind in its plans to build a British battery industry, with manufacturing capacity forecast to be barely half the needed level by the end of the decade, according to data produced by Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, one of the world's leading authorities on the battery industry. The report shows that the UK will have to increase the supply of lithium, cobalt and graphite, critical ingredients in battery production, by staggering amounts, as much as 90 times the current level, to have any hope of supplying that industry. 

Two Cornish companies, British Lithium and Cornish Lithium, are developing flowsheets for the extraction of lithium from mica in granite rocks in the St. Austell area and in west Cornwall Cornish Lithium is proceeding with its development of extracting lithium from geothermal waters and there was more good news that GeoCubed Ltd., a subsidiary company of Cornish Lithium, has successfully commissioned and delivered the Direct Lithium Extraction (DLE) Pilot Plant at Cornish Lithium’s Geothermal Waters Test Facility at United Downs. The DLE Pilot Plant has been designed to process Cornish geothermal waters using DLE technologies and is the first time that a DLE system has become operational in the UK. The £4.0 million Pilot Plant is being supported by the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Local Enterprise Partnership with £2.9 million from the UK Government’s Getting Building Fund. The Pilot Plant was successfully commissioned at the end of March, on time and on budget.

The pilot plant is expected to confirm that lithium can be produced in Cornwall from geothermal waters, and the pilot plant is expected to provide sufficient information to enable the design of a commercial lithium plant in the County. During the course of 2022, different DLE technologies will be tested, utilising the pilot plant, with a view to establishing the preferred technology for future DLE plants in Cornwall. 

A very interesting evening, and the next Cornish Mining Sundowner to look forward to will be at the Chain Locker on Thursday 19th May, from 5.30pm.

@barrywills

Monday 11 April 2022

Process mineralogy of unconventional mineral deposits

We are looking forward to November and our first face to face conference since November 2019. Process Mineralogy '22 will be held in Sitges, Spain, and there is now a call for abstracts for this, MEI's 6th International Symposium on Process Mineralogy, currently sponsored by Bruker, Zeiss and Promet101, with our media sponsor International Mining (see posting of 28 March).

With declining ore grades and increased ore complexity process mineralogy is now of vital importance within the mining industry. The application of process mineralogy can be used to solve problems and challenges, and to aid in the optimisation of mineral processing operations, contributing to increased value of ore concentrates produced.

However, how can the knowledge from, and experience with process mineralogy be applied to unconventional mineral deposits? This will be the question discussed in a keynote lecture by Dr. Kurt Aasly, of the Dept. of Geoscience and Petroleum at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU).

“Unconventional mineral deposits” he will identify as non-metallic industrial mineral deposits, construction materials, and various types of deep-sea mineral deposits. Case examples will be provided from quartz and quartzites used for silicon production, deep-sea minerals, and the pyrrhotite problem in aggregates for concrete. Emphasis will be on important parameters for such deposits, where grades are at different scales than for many metallic ores, or where grade is not even relevant, but other mineralogical properties are crucial for the performance.

Kurt Aasly received his M.Sc. and PhD from NTNU and was appointed Associate Professor of Process Mineralogy in 2012.  His main field of research and teaching is within process mineralogy and geometallurgy, focusing on industrial minerals and iron oxides. He has been project manager for the MarMine project, focusing on technological challenges related to exploitation of seafloor massive sulfide deposits and has also been responsible for establishing a mineral characterisation laboratory, as part of a larger National Research Infrastructure. Recently, Dr. Aasly has been involved in a research project related to characterisation and analyses of minute concentration of pyrrhotite in concrete aggregates.

We look forward to his presentation in Spain.

#ProcessMineralogy22

Thursday 7 April 2022

New Book: Electronic Waste: Recycling and Reprocessing for a Sustainable Future

MEI's 7th International Symposium on Sustainable Minerals (Sustainable Minerals '22) takes place online in July, and there is currently a final call for abstracts, with a deadline of the end of this month

The recycling of electronic waste is likely to feature heavily in the final programme, so it is a good time to announce a new book on the subject edited by Maria E. Holuszko, Amit Kumar and Denise C.R. Espinosa

In Electronic Waste: Recycling and Reprocessing for a Sustainable Future a team of expert sustainability researchers examine methods for extracting value from electronic waste while aiming for a zero-waste scenario in industrial production. The book discusses the manufacturing and use of materials in electronic devices while presenting an overview of separation methods for industrial materials. There is also a global overview of various national and international regulations related to the topic of electronic and electrical waste. 

This is a useful resource for scientists and engineers working in the production and development of electronic devices, the authors providing comprehensive overviews of the benefits of achieving a zero-waste solution in electronic and electrical waste, as well as the risks posed by incorrectly disposed of electronic waste. 

We hope to see the editors and contributors to this book represented in July at Sustainable Minerals '22.

#SustainableMinerals22

Monday 4 April 2022

Physical Separation '22 is now only a month away

Physical Separation '22 is MEI's first conference of the year, and will be held online from May 9-11. The provisional programme is available, and it is not too late to submit an abstract if you would like to make a presentation. 

The conference is sponsored by Hudbay Minerals, Gravity Mining and Steinert, with Media Partners International Mining and Imformed, and Industry Advocates the Coalition for Eco-Efficient Comminution (CEEC), the Cornwall Mining Alliance and the Critical Minerals Association.

The programme contains two keynote lectures. "New challenges for gravity concentration and classification of fine particles" will be given by Prof. Kevin Galvin, Laureate Professor at the University of Newcastle, Australia, and "The role of magnetic separation in the development of critical and strategic metal recovery flowsheets" will be given by Prof. Neil Rowson, Emeritus Professor, University of Birmingham and Laboratory Manager at Bunting-Redditch,UK.

Profs. Galvin and Rowson will also be panelists in the panel discussion "Looking to the future: Physical Separation in 2030", which will be chaired by Dr. Erin Bobicki, of the University of Toronto. The other panelists are Dr. Peter Amelunxen, of Hudbay Minerals, Canada, and Dr. Priscila Esteves, of Steinert, Brazil.

Registration is now open for this, MEI's 7th International Conference on Physical Separation.

#PhysicalSeparation22

Friday 1 April 2022

March: out of the frying pan and into the fire

Exactly two years ago today I began my monthly updates and the April 1st posting of 2020 was entitled March: the month that changed the world.

This could equally apply to March 2022. With the pandemic apparently receding, one horror has been replaced by another, the war in Ukraine, a truly horrific invasion by Russia's despotic Vladimir Putin. The innocent civilians have suffered dreadfully and the early reaction of the inept UK Government to admitting refugees into the country did not make me particularly proud to be British.

The Times, March 2nd

I sympathise with young people throughout Europe, as the threat of a new World War looms in the background. To me it has echoes of that other standoff between Russia and the west, the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. At the time I was just starting my final year at Grammar School, and failed my mock A-level GCEs as I felt that there was no point in working or studying, as we wouldn't be around much longer. Thankfully a compromise was soon reached and we can only hope that the Russia-Ukraine crisis comes to an end soon.

Although the UK only takes 4% of its natural gas from Russia, Europe's dependence on Russian gas has exacerbated the energy crisis and there is an urgent need for Europe to rid itself of its dependency on Russian oil and gas, and this has been helped by the announcement last week that the USA will supply Europe with liquified gas to reduce the reliance on Russia.

The UK government is considering delaying the closure of some of the UK’s last remaining coal-fired power stations and a task force is being set up to bolster the UK's oil, gas and nuclear supplies, two senior industry experts at its head reporting directly to the Prime Minister and advising on a 'transition period' focusing on fossil fuels, as the Government signals its clearest move yet away from the Net Zero target. The Government insists that the Net Zero 2050 target has not been scrapped and is still the ultimate goal. But they admitted that in the short term the focus will shift back to fossil fuels to ease the pain for British households. This will include oil and gas from the North Sea and Canada, while fracking is also now a possibility again.

Naturally many of the environmental groups insist that we switch immediately to renewables, with no account being taken of the enormous amounts of minerals needed for the transition. The graphic below shows a different way of looking at it:

Source: International Energy Agency

Although the pandemic is reportedly waning, in reality it isn't. Most of us know people who have Covid; Jon and his family all tested positive during the month. Work and education are being disrupted, and the NHS is under severe pressure again due to new patients and sick staff. Luckily the vaccinations are proving effective and symptoms now are generally mild but we have to wonder if lifting rules on face coverings was perhaps a little premature.

We are having to learn how to live with Covid, and it was good to be travelling again, and socialising with people of all nationalities. Early in the month I was in USA for the Annual SME Meeting, and my first international social event outside the conference was the International Reception in Salt Lake City.

With the International Mining team in Salt Lake City

The March Cornish Mining Sundowner was also well attended with CSM alumni from around the world, including an alumna from Moscow. Two days later over 200 crammed into the bar at the Falmouth Hotel for the CSM Annual Dinner, and there were a few reports of positive Covid tests a few days later.

A crowded Falmouth Hotel bar

With past and present CSM students at the CSM Annual Dinner

March has been a dire month, brightened a little by the arrival of spring. Let's hope that there are glimmers of hope in April.

Spring lightens the gloom

@barrywills