The aptly named Giant mine in Yellowknife, N.W.T., was bleeding red ink when Royal Oak Mines acquired Giant and other assets of the Pamour group late in 1990. By the time negotiations began with Local 4 of the Canadian Association of Smelter and Allied Workers (CASAW) in early 1992, mine site costs had been reduced to US$340 per oz. from more than US$400 in 1990. The company offered to maintain hourly wage rates, but wanted to trim benefits and peg future increases to the price of gold.
Union management called the new contract “humiliating.” At the 11th hour a tentative agreement was reached. But this was rejected by membership and a strike began May 23.
Days later, on Tuesday, May 26, strikers swarmed onto the mine site. The security force, which had a member injured in the ensuing fracas, quit. Byberg ordered the mill shut down and called everyone to C-Dry, where the doors were locked.
“Black Tuesday was a mental low,” Byberg says.
The next morning, a professional security force from Pinkertons arrived, and within 24 hours, Byberg says, spirits were up and climbing. “They were like gladiators rolling in. ”
As more and more replacement workers were brought in, tensions flared again. On June 14, a group of strikers broke through the gates throwing rocks. By the time the police riot team arrived, it was over.
Staff worked around the clock in the early days of the strike. “For the first three weeks, I was living on three hours of sleep a night,” Byberg recalls.
Integrating the replacement miners with the on-site workforce (staff and some union members who crossed the line) was not difficult, Byberg says, because most were experienced miners. “We just showed them their beds, told them what to do, and away they went.
Maintaining security was no easy task because the underground workings are accessed by four shafts, two service raises and five declines.
On Sept. 18, an explosion killed nine miners aboard a man-car on the 750-level. A police investigation found it had been deliberately set. Byberg will only say that the person(s) responsible knew the Giant mine well. “I expected this labor dispute to be violent, but never in my wildest dreams, did I ever expect that something like this could happen.”
The deaths of the miners remain unresolved as this is written; however, authorities have suspects and are pursuing leads. For many Yellowknife residents, healing will only begin when the truth is revealed.
“So much has gone on here in the last 10 months that if you treated it emotionally, it would rip you apart,” says Byberg.
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