Mining Statistics

by KUMIKO YAMAZAKI on July 23, 2009 • manifold map visualization: mining • COMMENT

So what do you do when a friend wonders about mining fatalities and the difficulties of putting into perspective the differences between U.S. and China? You make a map!.. an infographic?

A bit time consuming but I miss the design aspects of mapmaking especially in this age where mashups rule. This is not to say I’m against mashups – in fact, like a good geo-data girl, I’ve uploaded the U.S. mining dataset to Geocommons. Did you know Geocommons already provides 15 pages of ‘mining’ data already?

China’s figure of 3,215 coal mining deaths was provided by their State Administration of Work Safety (which, by the way, had originally mistakenly announced that 91,172 people have perished. Still, 3,215 deaths is 107 TIMES the number of deaths in the U.S. (30). It’s hard to believe China has actually reduced the number of mining accidents over the years. In 2003? 7,200 deaths….