The area above the orebody subsided after millions of tons of ore was removed. The 'mine field', where all extraction wells were drilled, is now a giant lake. This photo shows a storage tank, as well as numerous electric lines, partly submerged out in the lake.
We then moved on to the field warehouse, which was used to store drilling supplies and spare parts for field crews.
Inside, labelled shelves would have held everything from pipe fittings to valves to pump parts. Some of them had rolling ladders on rails to access upper shelves.
Field offices are through this door.
Based on the amount of debris on the floor, the field warehouse looks to have flooded recently, possibly during Hurricane Harvey.
This is the back side of the field warehouse, most offices are in the tan, stuccoed portion.
This Komatsu excavator has probably been here since the mine shut down.
This old-style drill derrick was found in a pasture several hundred yards from the field warehouse. I'm not sure if it was used at the mine, or in the adjacent oil and gas field - we drove by quite a few producing wells very close to the mine.
These Quonset huts, in the shadow of the plant stacks, seem to have been used for general storage. A diesel tank and pump was located around the back for fueling field equipment.
We then moved to the mine's equipment shop.
The shop appears to be used by a local golf club to store and maintain golf carts. There is a fairly serious-looking overhead crane installed here. Given the nature of Frasch mines, no oversized equipment was used at the mine.
The mine used to have a fairly extensive railroad network near the sulfur vats, used to transport sulfur to customers. This rail buggy, located in front of the main shop, was no doubt used on it.
The processing plant stood here previously. Its stacks and foundations remain; the steel plant frame was removed about ten years ago. Beyond, you can see the Wharton County Generating plant, a natural-gas plant running off the area's active oil and gas wells.
Across from the main shop are the mine's offices and laboratories. The white truck and excavator belong to a crew tearing down at least one of these structures. We passed by work trucks and this crew; nobody seemed to mind us poking around and taking pictures, and the mine wasn't even posted.
