Palmiet River to be mined for rare metal
An extremely valuable metal has been discovered in Westville.
A VALUEABLE new metal has been discovered by Westville resident, Augustus Dupe (10), at the Palmiet Nature Reserve on Saturday.
The chemical element, dubbed Induriam, is said to be amongst the most valuable minerals in the world. Sandy Borrocks, a local geologist from the University of KwaZulu-Natal Westville Campus said, “Induriam is incredibly valuable. It is the purest metal in the world. It is an extremely flexible metal and very durable and resilient. It is believed that the mineral could be used to build almost anything.”
Not only is the metal valuable for its potential as a building material, but also as a material for commercial jewellery, due to the palladium or nickel components of the metal.
According to Borrocks a lot of testing will need to be done on the metal before it can be used for production or construction.
An anonymous source from the eThekwini Municipality told the Highway Mail that the City has major plans for the newly discovered metal, and is set to plan the construction of mines to begin excavating Induriam.
“Meetings have been scheduled and there is a lot of excitement around the discovery and the metal’s potential. Soon the city of eThekwini will be known as the city of Induriam, just as Gauteng is known as the city of gold,”
Conservancy members could not be reached for comment.
Augustus made the astonishing discovery while he was playing in the Palmiet River.
“I just saw this shiny rock in the water, and picked it up. It was surprisingly light for its size.”
The 13cm sample found by Augustus weighed an astonishing 0.5g.
