Closure of Callahan Mine Superfund site to start in October
Project predicts 1,500 truck trips through Brooksville to mitigate further pollution
A truck belonging to Sargent Corporation, the construction firm contracted by the Army Corps of Engineers to close the Callahan Mine Superfund Site. The truck sits at the gate leading to the final work site. Photo by John Epstein.
Sept. 15, 2026
By John Epstein
CAPE ROSIER – Starting in early October, large dump trucks will be rumbling through Brooksville on a regular basis, carrying material to cover a waste rock pile at the old Callahan Mine site on Cape Rosier. The mine has been designated a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Superfund site since 2002 due to the leaching of arsenic and other toxics – by-products of the mining process – into nearby waterways and groundwater.
Sargent Corporation will be the contractor performing this work, according to information released by the Orono-based company.
The Callahan Mine operated for approximately four years between 1968 and 1972, extracting zinc and copper from a huge open pit.
“There was an accident that killed one man and injured two others, and the mine went down soon afterwards,” said Earl Clifford, Jr., president of the Brooksville Historical Society.
A section of the partially remediated Callahan Mine site looking out onto Holbrook Island Sanctuary. Photo by John Epstein.
The area had been a mining site since the late 19th century, according to Clifford. His father, Earl, Sr., had worked in old mine shafts at the site for a Canadian prospecting firm in the 1950s.
Learn more about Earl, Sr.’s experience at the mine in a separate story in this week’s edition of The Rising Tide.
Sebastian Bennage, who handles communications for Sargent Corporation, said the Army Corps of Engineers selected the 650-employee, heavy civil construction firm by a competitive bidding process. In a written statement, Bennage said that “truck traffic delivering materials to the site will be limited to six trucks per day.”
The large dump trucks will travel on Route 176 through Buck Harbor village, Brooksville’s downtown, before making their way to the Cape Rosier mine site. They will be loaded with crushed stone that, along with an “impermeable membrane,” is expected to protect the surrounding environment of the mine – land, air, and water – from further pollution dangers.
Bennage has referred all questions about truck weight and traveling speed, liability insurance, the impermeable membrane, and Sargent’s experience with environmental remediation to the Corps of Engineers. The Corps public affairs office did not respond to messages from The Rising Tide before publication.
Linda Gifford, who lives in Cape Rosier and is a member of Brooksville’s Select Board, said the trucks are expected to drive slowly and will make approximately 1,500 trips over the course of the coming months.
“The company said they will stop operating when the roads get bad in the winter, and then resume in the spring,” Gifford said.
