After nearly 500 years of mining, Cerro Rico, the Bolivian mountain whose silver financed the Spanish Empire, is experiencing increasingly frequent and severe cave-ins.
With silver prices at decade highs, mining activity on Cerro Rico has surged in recent years, but the collapses endanger the safety and livelihoods of communities living and working on the mountain.
Efforts to preserve the mountain have been delayed and ineffective.
by Benjamin Swift
https://news.mongabay.com/2025/10/in-the-heart-of-bolivia-the-mountain-that-financed-an-empire-risks-collapsing/
