Talk:Red Dog Mine, Alaska

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Census data
Proving a negative is a difficult task.

In this case I want to prove that no one "lives" in the Red Dog Mine CDP, but am unable to find a published source stating so. Nor can I find a published source stating that no one lives on top of Mt. Edgecumbe, near Sitka. But I could create a published source (the US census for 2010) claiming that the summit of Mt. Edgcumbe is indeed inhabited if I report in 2010 that I live there with my 15 children.

All employees of the Red Dog mine work and stay at the mine in shifts several weeks long. All stay in the mine's PAC (Personnel Accommodation Center). No houses or homes exist in the CDP (as correctly reported by the census).

The census data for the Red Dog Mine CDP is a result of the reporting oddity that of the hundreds of employees of the Red Dog mine, a few individuals chose to report the mine, their worksite, as their home. A perhaps not unreasonable choice, if those individuals actually were "homeless" when not at work, e.g., staying with friends, family, or traveling the world.

My point is that the reported census data gives a ridiculously wrong report; at any given time there are hundreds of people working, eating, and sleeping within the Red Dog Mine CDP - this is verifiable - see the references within the Red Dog mine article; but zero people (not 32) "live" there.

Are aircraft carriers reported as CDP's? Certainly some of the hundreds of military teenagers who serve on them have no houses or apartments back in the US. But to have a Wikipedia article blandly stating that the population of the USS Nimitz is 32 would be absurd. As is the census report that the Red Dog Mine CDP has a population of 32.

It is still my contention that the Red Dog Mine CDP does not warrant an article. It is of interest only to statisticians, mensurators, and census-takers interested in how difficult it is to catagorize data, and how that data can be mis-collected and mis-represented. The article as it stands, although it accurately parrots the 2000 census data, has a 100% misleading/false demographics section, and makes Wikipedia look like the unintelligent junk some people (not me) like to claim it is.CGX (talk) 05:35, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

NO one cares about the CDP
But lots of people are interested in the mine.

The Red Dog Mine CDP wikipedia article is number 2 when one googles red dog mine.

All those googlers are after facts on the mine, not the CDP.

That is why it is appropriate to strip the article on the CDP to a bare minimum, rather than leave misleadingly-summerized references to the mine on the CDP page. Let them click through to the mine article.CGX (talk) 05:42, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Communication
Red Dog Mine is the location for the United States largest Dish Network install of 380 receivers all linked to 2 satellite dishes via fiber optics at the main camp based close o the mine it self. Installed by [Satellite Alaska] out of Anchorage Alaska and Earth Station Communication & Security out of Danville Illinois. The system bosts one recever per room at the man camp based at the mine. An additional 40 receivers to the 380 at the port located at the other end of the 52 mile road.