Nearly half of all gold mined during recorded history has come in the past 120 years from “The Rand” —t he Witwatersrand Basin in South Africa. Scientists estimate roughly one-third of the world’s gold resources still lie unmined in the nine million acres of this ancient lake or sea bed, whose name means “ridge of white waters” in Afrikaans.
Each day, roughly 4,000 miners take the plunge to get to the bottom of the mine. The journey includes taking the world’s tallest elevator, which hits a top speed at 40 mph, to make their way down.
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