2023 with MEI: Business as normal

After three awful years due to the pandemic, 2023 was the year when life returned to normal and travel resumed without the need for negative Covid tests or display of vaccination history. Nevertheless travel disruption played a major role in movements during the year.

Barbara and I were away roughly half of January. The first two weeks of the month we spent in the Spanish Canary Islands, After a few days on the island of Tenerife we took the short ferry journey westwards to La Gomera, the third smallest of the eight main islands of this volcanic archipelago and the only one that has not had any volcanic activity in the last 2 million years. This prolonged inactivity has allowed much erosion, producing deep gullies and dramatic contours rising to an altitude of almost 1500 metres, and the drive from the ferry terminal at San Sebastion across the mountains to our base at Playa de Santiago was truly spectacular.

Later in the month we visited Jon and family in their new home in Luxembourg, the small European country, only three quarters the size of Cornwall, surrounded by Belgium, Germany and France. 

While we were in Luxembourg, Amanda and Richard spent a week in Upper Egypt, exploring the region around Luxor and Aswan, one of the most fascinating places on earth, while a few days after we returned to the UK Jon and family left Luxembourg for a week in the French Alps, the children's first skiing holiday. 

Then it was back to the serious stuff, starting with my annual visit to the USA for the SME Annual Meeting, this year held in Denver. The SME Meeting always provides a good opportunity for meeting people, and the first that I encountered on entering the giant exhibition area were representatives from Metcelerate, one of the sponsors of Flotation '23 later in the year.

With Metcelerate's Diana Drinkwater, Romke Kuyvenhoven and Robert Seitz

The Denver SME was, as always a great experience, this year attended by 6466 delegates from 30 countries, but it was sad to see how downtown Denver had deteriorated during the pandemic, the once pristine 16th Street Mall looking very tired.

Back home Barbara and I joined over 250 current and past students and staff of Camborne School of Mines at the Falmouth Hotel for the Annual CSM Association dinner, always a good opportunity to catch up with old friends from around the world.

After a three and a half year enforced absence due to the pandemic it was great to be back in Cape Town in April for Comminution '23,  Attended by 215 delegates from 30 countries this was our first face-to-face comminution event since Comminution '18.

I must admit to having been a little apprehensive after such a long time out- would the Vineyard Hotel still provide the exceptional level of service that we had grown accustomed to?  I need not have worried, the facilities, food and the beautiful gardens were as we left them in 2019 and we knew that we could relax and look forward to many other events at this stunning venue.

After Comminution ‘23 Barbara and I spent six fabulous days in Botswana, a post-conference tour that we would highly recommend to anyone coming out to Cape Town for an MEI Conference. 

On Amanda's return to Cornwall she flew to the nearby Isles of Scilly for the World Pilot Gig Championships. The Cornish pilot gig is a six-oared rowing boat, recognised as one of the first shore-based lifeboats that went to vessels in distress, with recorded rescues going back as far as the late 17th century. The World Championships were first held in 1990, only attracting a few crews from Cornwall, but over the years the amount of pilot gigs attending has increased with crews coming from all over the South of England and Wales, the Netherlands, Ireland, France and beyond. Amanda rows with the Ladies Super Vets crew of the Helford River Gig Club, and the great news for Cornwall was that the Helford River women's A crew became World Champions at the event.

Amanda (left) with the Helford Ladies Super Vets C Crew

Falmouth lies between two of the world's most beautiful rivers, the Fal in the north and the Helford in the south, the latter being famous for its many creeks, such as Frenchman's Creek, so it is no surprise that the gig club on the Helford is a major part of Amanda's life.

Early morning on the Helford River

Relaxing after a hard training session!

The weather in Falmouth in June for Biomining '23 and Sustainable Minerals '23 was stunning, and the estuary of the River Fal and the 16th century Pendennis Castle which overlooks it provided great photo opportunities for the conference delegates on their evening guided walks to Falmouth's famous Chain Locker pub.

Biomining '23 delegates by the Fal estuary

Sustainable Minerals '23 delegates at the entrance to the 16th century Pendennis Castle...

... and relaxing at the Chain Locker

Fourteen countries were represented at each conference, with 55 delegates at each.  The National Maritime Museum was a great venue and it was good to be back there after a 3 year lay-off due to Covid, but travel to Cornwall for delegates from overseas was longer and more frustrating than in previous years, due to travel delays and rail strikes and the expense and difficulty in obtaining visas experienced by many. 

Because of this we made the difficult decision to abandon Falmouth as a conference venue for the foreseeable future, and the six conferences in our portfolio will now be held in Cape Town. 

Three days after the June conferences Barbara and I had a bizarre journey to Africa. We were on our way to Zambia and the SAIMM Copper-Cobalt conference at Victoria Falls, but not to be unfortunately. Travelling from Falmouth to Heathrow was the beginning of our woes, with cancelled and delayed trains, validating our decision to mothball our UK conferences. We eventually arrived at Heathrow Airport after a journey of eight hours, just in time for boarding the BA flight to Johannesburg. We eventually boarded one hour late, but the plane then spent a further two hours on the tarmac, while we sweltered in the heat with no air conditioning. At last we arrived at Oliver Tambo Airport, Johannesburg, to find that our connecting flight to Livingstone had already left. 

We found that there was only one flight per day to Livingstone and that the next day's flight was already full!  Not wishing to spend two nights in Johannesburg, or to arrive at the end of the conference, we made the decision to return home on the evening flight after spending only 7 hours in Africa! 

Preparing for the journey back to London!

There were thankfully no travel problems in July, when Barbara and I spent a few days in Birmingham, the UK's second-largest city, in the heart of the Midlands. It is a vibrant city, criss-crossed with canals from the industrial revolution, many of which today are lined with trendy bars and restaurants.

Birmingham was the first major manufacturing city in the world, producing a diverse range of products in small workshops with exceptional levels of inventiveness. In the core years of the industrial revolution, between 1760 and 1850, Birmingham residents registered over three times as many patents as those of any other British town or city. The  most significant development was that of James Watt and Matthew Boulton, who in 1775 formed a partnership to exploit Watt's patent for a steam engine with a separate condenser, a much more efficient use of fuel than in the older Newcomen engine which was in use at the time. The new engine was rapidly adopted by the Cornish tin and copper mines and was later refined by the Cornish mining engineer Richard Trevithick.

The gilded statue of Boulton, Watt and their employee and later partner William Murdoch

I am used to travelling thousands of miles to conferences, so it was a pleasure to attend the UK Mining Conference in September, which was held 5 minutes away at the Princess Pavilion in Falmouth.

The conference was attended by over 280 delegates from the whole mining supply chain and it was good to see so many young people at the event, especially young women pursuing careers in mining and geology.  Some of the Camborne School of Mines (CSM) students are photographed below with me and Carol Richards, the CSM Association secretary.  

Young people are the lifeblood of sustainability in the mining industry and I aimed my invited talk, on the evolution of mineral processing, at these students, hoping that I could inspire them to enter this most crucial operation in the mining chain. It is estimated that by 2029 over half of the current worldwide mining workforce  will have retired. In contrast, by 2040, total mineral demand is expected to double, so, we won’t have the workforce to tackle these challenges unless we continue to recruit and train the next generation of workers. The mining schools are an essential part of that process.

The conference ended with a gala dinner at Falmouth's National Maritime Museum and I was pleased to receive the UK Mining Lifetime Achievement Award, which I accepted on behalf of MEI (posting of 20th September).

With Barbara and Amanda at the gala dinner

And it was great to hear that Amanda's voluntary work, for a charity supporting people affected by domestic abuse and sexual violence, was recognised by a nomination for The King’s Award for Voluntary Service celebrating the outstanding work of local volunteer groups across the UK.

October was a quiet month, in preparation for Flotation '23, although Amanda and family did manage a two-week break in Madagascar before she set off for Cape Town.

Unfortunately Barbara and I experienced travel woes again en route to Cape Town, as Storm Ciarán caused devastation over southern England and all trains out of Cornwall were cancelled.  We managed to hitch a lift to Plymouth in Devon only to find that there was no rail or coach travel from there to Heathrow, so we had to take a very expensive taxi journey to the airport (posting of 2nd November 2023).

However it was all worth it in the end as Flotation '23 exceeded all our expectations, with 336 delegates from 32 countries, the biggest MEI Conference in our history and we really appreciate the wonderful reaction to the conference on LinkedIn.

As at the UK conference two months earlier, it was encouraging to see so many young people, both from industry and academia, the largest contingent being from the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, Germany:

The many photos taken at the conference are in an album, but a selection are shown below:

My photo of the week is of me, Amanda, Barbara and Jon with our longest serving conference delegate, Prof. Antonio Peres, of Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Brazil, who commented "It is a pleasure and honour for me to be part of the magnificent history of MEI. Our partnership and friendship started in 1991, in Camborne, with "Reagents", and goes on for over 30 years. Congratulations for MEI's success which arose from the hard and competent work of the Wills family". Your kind comments are much appreciated, Antonio, and it has been a pleasure having you with us at many (lost count!!) MEI Conferences.

Many of the delegates, some with their families, made the most of their journey to Cape Town by staying on and enjoying some of the delights of this beautiful region (10 good reasons to spend some time in Cape Town) and Jon and Amanda met up with Minerals Engineering editor Pablo Brito-Parada in Camp's Bay, and later Amanda joined Barbara and me for lunch at Kalk Bay.

Then back to the cold and wet, Luxembourg for Jon and Cornwall for Amanda, Barbara and me, where we are already planning for next year's events in Cape Town. Best wishes to you all for 2024.