The turnout for this year's SME Arizona conference at the Hilton Conquistador in Tucson on Monday was huge, although I don't have hard numbers. AZGS Senior Geologist Jon Spencer presented his "Reconstruction of Cenozoic Tectonic Extension in Southeastern Arizona and Implications for Porphyry-Copper Exploration."
One of the more interesting tidbits - the Ray mine is adding four new 700-ton capacity trucks to their fleet each year and linking them into a GPS-based system for centralized management.
I missed out on the great set of talks to attend the hearing of the Ad Hoc Committee on Mining Regulations in Phoenix.