Meet Zach from Mining

Video transcript:

Hi my name is Zach English and I am a Heavy Equipment Operator at The Quartz Corporation. Being a heavy equipment operator at The Quartz Corporation just taking part of the blasting and moving the rock. Good rock and waste rock to the appropriate area and haul rock to the crusher load. Load trucks to go to the plant.

I was born and raised here in Spruce Pine NC and went to Appalachian State for two years and wasn’t sure what I wanted to do and went to the United States Navy for four years. I believe that being in the military helped me with the structure of like a chain of command and I feel like I have always enjoyed having a good structure where I worked and feel like The Quartz Corporation also we have a really good chain of command and I think that really helps with everybody being where they need to be and doing what they need to do. Especially up here in the mines where it can be dangerous if you don’t know what you're doing and where you're supposed to be.

The most interesting part about my job would be just that every day when you come in here with different weather, you come in after a weekend, you never know what the mine is going to give you. I believe that all of us working together to find the best way to do the job for that day is the interesting and rewarding part of the job.

You really are able to expand what you want to do. I started out just driving trucks and then driving excavators, bulldozers, and you can really cross-train. I think The Quartz Corporation really allows us to be the best we can be and do what we want to do.

I feel valued that anytime we are doing anything new or moving somewhere else I am always asked what I think about anyways that we can do it better and I just really think that just being a valued part of the team feels really good.