Ann: Trading Halt , page-44

Fluffynymph,
There is nothing bizarre about the Namibian project. Compared with a land project there is no crushing to do (the stuff is phosphatic sediment - it's already been crushed by nature for us) and there is no worry about aboriginal land rights - it's in the sea. Also some of it is at depths that current dredgers operate at. Recall that artificial island in Dubai shaped like a palm tree was built using dredgers operating at the same depth. The physics of airlift pumps is not rocket science, so it is just an engineering problem to suck the phosphatic sediment up. Take a look at youtube to see an airlift pump work.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xpbuBliaeE

The weight of the air, water and phosphatic sediment in the pipe at any one time is less than the weight of water it displaces. It therefore has to "jump" up the pipe into the ship. Very simple really. Not bizarre at all.