INDIAN RIVER COUNTY — When Wild Turkey Sand Mine opened this week it became the first new mine in Indian River County since a 2008 moratorium on new sand and rock mines in the county.
Wild Turkey Estates LLC owns 835 acres at 4705 82nd Ave. in the unincorporated county. The open pit mining area will occupy about 220 acres of the tract.
Despite its name, the mine will produce a variety of material besides sand, including large rip-rap rock for seawalls and crushed stone for road base. Sand from the site could conceivably be used for beach nourishment if the county ever resumes its beach restoration program.
“The range of materials we have here is rare in Indian River County,” says Todd Brognano, one of the partners in the mine ownership group. “The mine will end up being a big benefit to the community because builders will be able to save money by using local materials instead of trucking stuff in.”
Brognano says there is 10 million tons of rock and sand on the site suitable for mining, and that the mine will operate for 10 years under its current permit.
The bulk of the material in the mine is coquina rock. Called Donak Variabilis by geologists, coquina “is mainly composed of incompletely consolidated sedimentary rock . . . a mixture of small marine clams, crushed oyster shell, mollusk shell, fragmented fossils, fragmented coral, crinoids, limestone, red sand, white sand, phosphate, calcite, and perhaps a little clay,” according to coquinarock.com. “It is relatively soft when quarried, and hardens over the years” making it a good substrate material for road building and construction fill.
Mining has already begun at the site with the various materials being extracted and stockpiled. Brognano says the mine will employ seven people to start, not including truckers. He does not have contracts in hand but is talking to a number of contractors about supplying materials, including the company widening I-95.
Wild Turkey Sand Mine had begun the permitting process in in 2007 when local opposition to another mine on 82nd Ave., where several mines were already operating, caused the Planning and Zoning Commission to vote for a moratorium that was approved by the Board of County Commissioners.
“The moratorium went into effect in January 2008,” Brognano says. “It ended a year later after more than 30 new mining regulations were put in place that added $30,000 to the cost of opening this mine.”
Residents were concerned about truck traffic on 82nd Avenue and the effect a deep pit mine would have on the water table. Some feared the pit would leach water from beneath their property and deplete groundwater.
With those concerns resolved to commissioners’ satisfaction the Wild Turkey Sand Mine was finally permitted.
Congressman Bill Posey, Indian River County Administrator Joe Baird and Indian River County Commissioners Wesley Davis, Joe Flescher and Bob Solari attended the opening event along with about 30 others, according to Brognano,